Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

The noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, put his finger on the problem which was created by Mr Blunkett’s abolition of appeals in immigration cases and the creation of a single tier. I am sure that when he did so—although I have not had the opportunity of checking Hansard—he said that it would be a faster and more efficient way of dealing with immigration cases, which is almost exactly the language that the Minister has used in his response. He is looking for efficiency and speed. What we are looking for is justice. When you are concerned with people’s lives, as all these issues are, efficiency and speed is all very well from the Home Office’s point of view but it may not be the proper approach at all from the individual’s point of view. Just as an illustration of how the problem has been created, I have been instructed while the Minister was responding that Government inaction over Zimbabwe in the last two years has led in the High Court to 150 applications for judicial review for fresh claims but 500 applications for reconsideration. It is the abolition of the second tier that used to exist that has created all the pressure on the administrative court. As the Minister has admitted, it has also caused the matter to be brought back to us prior to all the procedures that we were assured would happen and before we have the opportunity to consider how the tribunal system is going to work. I detected in the contributions of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, and the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, suggestions that we should be looking to some proper way of sifting these applications and determining which should go to the Upper Tribunal and which should be retained in the High Court. The Minister refers to a case-by-case approach but this particular clause does not refer to such an approach. The clause would permit all cases of this of type judicial review to be transferred to the Upper Tribunal without there being any sifting process as to which are more important and complex and which should be heard in the High Court. Perhaps a way forward is that between now and Report stage for us consider whether applications for judicial review should remain in the High Court, which is the traditional role of that court over centuries in supervising inferior tribunals. The judge who considers applications for judicial review should have the power to direct that the individual case could go to the Upper Tribunal. As the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, has pointed out, many of these cases are concerned with factual rather than with complex, legal issues. An expertise would no doubt develop eventually so that a proper sifting process should occur. However, that is not in the Bill now and I believe that we can put our heads together and come forward with something that is far more satisfactory and in accord with what we were discussing when the 2007 Act went through this House. For the moment, in the hope that the Minister will respond to further consultation, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 111BA withdrawn. Amendments 111C and 111D had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List. Amendment 111DA not moved. Amendments 111E and 111F had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List. Clause 50 agreed. House resumed.