Policing and Crime Bill

My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister and his Bill team for the meeting which they organised to address our concerns on this part of the Bill and for the subsequent and very full letter in which he further elaborates on Clause 97. I fully understand what the Government are doing; I just do not agree with it. It will be quite important for some of the contents of his letter to be on the record in Hansard, so I hope he will forgive me for referring to it in some detail. One sentence gave me some cause for concern, notably when he says: ""I think we all recognise that UKBA officers have a very difficult job to do but that they carry out their functions to a high standard and in a professional manner. There is no question of these officers routinely disregarding the clear statutory and non-statutory limits imposed upon them and deliberately misusing their customs powers for immigration purposes"." I emphasise "routinely disregarding" because I am concerned that United Kingdom Border Agency officers should never even think of disregarding, never mind routinely disregarding, parliamentary legislation. Therein lies the rub. In another part of the letter we are told that monitoring of these officers will be done by the chief inspector of the UKBA. I would be amazed if he routinely disregarded what his officers were doing. Will his report on their performance be made public? If we are to satisfy ourselves that all is well with this dual-category organisation, which has enormous powers, we will need to assure ourselves that they are performing their functions in a legal and proper way. Who is to know whether they are using their powers under Schedule 7 to the Terrorism Act 2000 or these powers? That Act already gives them power to demand passports or identity documents, including on common travel area routes, presumably on intelligence gained from somewhere. So why these extra powers? Is the Minister able to tell me how things have got so much worse recently in the CTA between the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and the Crown Dependencies? Are there suddenly hordes of people coming into this country from these areas in which the intelligence community has an interest? Are there any statistics the Minister can give me to back this up? In his letter, he talks about the mix of people in arrivals and writes: ""Officers may be targeting other higher risk flights but might inadvertently breach the restriction on asking for passports from CTA travellers"." I thought these highly trained officers were acting on intelligence to target certain people, not inadvertently breaching the restriction on asking for passports from CTA travellers. However, I was heartened to read that misuse of these customs powers for checking the immigration status of a traveller would be unlawful, but who will be qualified enough in the travelling general public to stand up for their rights if they feel they are being infringed? The Minister goes on to say that European law does not allow for customs checks on movements between the Republic of Ireland and the UK to be used disproportionately. What does that mean? Who will decide what is proportionate? Will the Minister undertake to have guidance on this published and visible to the travelling public at ports of entry so that they may know the reason why such checks are being undertaken? If he will not go so far, will he ensure that anyone stopped is, rather like police stop-and- account procedure, given a copy of the reasons for the stop? I must comment on consultation. Since I began on this lonely road a few days ago, I have had a number of e-mails, notably from the Isle of Man. I am advised that proper consultation on these proposed measures has not taken place. Indeed, in appendix 1 of his letter, the Minister states quite clearly: ""Consultation was not deemed necessary … as the measures are to clarify and support current operational practice and will not introduce any new requirements to carry passports where none have previously been required"." I think residents of the Isle of Man might find that explanation a bit elliptical. I am reminded that while the Isle of Man is in a customs union with the UK, that might not always be the case. The UK has just unilaterally amended the so-called common purse agreement with the Isle of Man, which will ensure that it will lose a significant proportion of its existing VAT revenue, so there is justification for concern about this Government’s mission creep. Let me clear on this matter: as there are no plans for actual fixed identity controls, will there be ad hoc identity checks on people from the Isle of Man? If so, what happens if the person stopped does not have a requisite document? The Minister’s assertion in Committee that some sort of photo ID is required and that he could not think of any exceptions is wrong. Not all Manx residents have passports, and there may well be very good reasons for people to travel from there at short notice for, say, urgent medical treatment. Does this not create a default position whereby the only way anybody can prove they have a right to be in the UK is on production of a passport or some other identifying document not presently needed for travel purposes? Finally, I reiterate the crux of my concerns that vesting customs and immigration powers in one individual will obviously mean that a document check for customs purposes will also be a document check for immigration purposes. How else can it be? The UKBA officer’s responsibilities are deliberately interchangeable, and it is disingenuous to say that these powers are to be used only for customs purposes. I urge the Minister to wait until there has been proper consultation in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, particularly so that people can fully understand the implications of this proposal. As far as the other Crown dependencies and the Republic of Ireland are concerned, I say simply this; you have been warned. I beg to move.