My Lords, we have a problem here. Under Section 2 of the UK Borders Act 2007, an immigration officer can detain someone for only three hours, whereas the customs, under the legislation quoted by the Minister, have always been able to detain someone for a period of six hours. In Clause 22(4), we are talking about an office of the UK Border Agency. The noble Lord has just said that because the customs function is to be integrated within the UK Border Agency, it has suddenly acquired the power to detain someone for six hours, when up until the point when the Bill comes into effect, no immigration officer will have been able to detain someone in one of the offices for longer than three hours. We have just learnt that this afternoon, somewhat to my distress. I was involved in the detail of the UK Borders Act proceedings in Committee and on Report and I thought three hours was a perfectly legitimate maximum. To learn that we have suddenly doubled that to six hours is a matter of enormous concern. I hope the Minister will be able to clear up that discrepancy.
Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]
Proceeding contribution from
Lord Avebury
(Liberal Democrat)
in the House of Lords on Wednesday, 25 March 2009.
It occurred during Debate on bills on Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL].
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Reference
709 c698 
Session
2008-09
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