I am unashamedly moving lots of amendments, and there are several others that we on these Benches support too, which I will come to in due course. The large number of changes that we want reflects our hostility to this Bill, which we oppose outright and will vote against this evening as ill-conceived and regressive, and which will do little to move the country towards the Government’s increasingly ludicrous-looking net migration target. If the Bill passes, perhaps one or two of these amendments might provide a little comfort in an otherwise bleak piece of legislation.
New clauses 16 and 17 seek to rectify two provisions that exemplify for us where fundamental problems lie with this Bill. New clause 16 would put in place some restriction on one of the many significant, inappropriate and untrammelled powers that the Bill passes to immigration officers and other officials. A large part of the Bill seems to be a wish list of powers from UK immigration staff, which the Government unquestioningly want to hand over to them.