I rise to support the amendments in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock). I am proud to speak on behalf of my Vauxhall constituents, many of whom have contacted me about this important issue. In my constituency—as in many others, to be fair—we celebrate diversity and welcome people from all over the world who are fleeing war and persecution. We stand in solidarity with them. I am sure that it is the same across the UK. Nobody in my constituency wants to see the continuation of the horrific scenes we are seeing across the channel.
Let us look at some of the statistics: 2022 saw an average of over 100 people a day—five times higher than the figure in 2020—take the perilous journey across the channel. More than 40 people attempted to cross the channel on a single day just before Christmas. The dinghy they were on contained Afghan nationals fleeing the Taliban, and a dozen unaccompanied children. Tragically, the dinghy capsized, resulting in the death of four people. The sad reality is that these people were ruthlessly exploited in their most vulnerable moments by people traffickers. It is right that we in this House come together and do everything in our power to stop the horrific loss of life.
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The Opposition believe that we must crack down on the criminal gangs that have made nearly £180 million in the last 12 months via the exploitation of vulnerable people, but let us be clear: this Bill is not the solution. It does more to criminalise vulnerable victims than to punish those responsible. In fact, the Bill in its current form solves no single problem driving this humanitarian emergency. It lacks any effective measures to tackle the criminal activity of people-smuggling gangs, and fails to eliminate the backlog of outstanding asylum cases, which I and many other MPs see in our caseloads on a weekly—sometimes daily—basis. The Bill will increase the number of people in temporary accommodation, including a hotel in my constituency that was initially designed to house only single men; we are now seeing families and young children housed in those hotels.
Most shamefully, the Bill leaves the victims of modern slavery without any protection. Never in my wildest dreams did I think that, having been elected, I would have to debate this issue. It really saddens me. Instead of cheap headlines, it would be so great to see the Home Secretary concentrating on reforming resettlement schemes to prevent the dangerous journeys from happening, and engaging in the hard work of diplomacy to get our international partners to provide support in working on this together. Britain cannot solve this alone; we have to work with the international community, and there is a clear pathway to do so, as outlined in some of the amendments to which many hon. and right hon. Member have spoken today.
The sharp spike in channel crossings that we are seeing has not happened in a vacuum. It has been exacerbated by a void of safe and legal routes into this country for those facing violence and persecution in their own countries. Of all the amendments and new clauses outlined today, I will focus on the important amendment 148, which has been touched on already. It cannot be right that unaccompanied children are risking their lives with no protection. Removing unaccompanied children, as the Bill proposes, will not stop that danger. Instead, it will prevent them from getting the support they need. How can the Minister think about the scenes I described earlier—a dozen children on a boat that capsizes in the channel, desperate in the cold December winter—and not recognise that we must do everything in our power to open up safe routes to those children? It is unacceptable and inhumane not to do that, so I urge everyone to support amendment 148.
Alongside that is the crucial work we must do with our international neighbours to establish safe routes for asylum seekers and really crack down on people smuggling. Sadly, what do we get with the current Government? We see measures that will prevent Sudanese and Afghan women subjected to sex trafficking in the UK from accessing support. As many hon. and right hon. Member have highlighted, the Bill will not clamp down on the abuse of modern slavery; it is a trafficker’s charter. That is why we should also support amendment 288, which would remove the provision to restrict modern slavery support. Many organisations have highlighted that they are yet to see any evidence that that support system is being exploited, including Anti-Slavery International—one of the oldest human rights organisations, which is based in my constituency and works really hard to end and eliminate all forms of slavery.
The modern slavery support provisions not only help the victims of the most horrific crimes; they also help us to catch and identify the gangs. We know that modern slavery victims are subject to coercive control by their traffickers, and that coming forward to report their experience takes considerable courage. Again, I reference the meeting last week of the Women for Refugee Women and the Rainbow Sisters. There were powerful testimonies from a number of women who shared their experiences and spoke about their fear of being sent back into the hands of the people who had abused them. A blanket ban on anyone arriving here to accessing the only statutory system that helps identify and support victims is wrong. The Bill seeks to deny them basic support, which is shameful. No sensible migration policy should actively make it easier for criminals to avoid accountability—that is what we would have. That is
what is in front of us now. Moreover, granting the Home Office powers to detain women, children, those who are pregnant and those who are disabled in prison-like settings just for seeking asylum is wrong.
I hope that the Minister will listen and that he will have some compassion, some empathy, for those who are reaching out to us as constituency MPs with their cases—these are people who are speaking out on behalf of people who do not have a voice. I urge the Government to change tack on the Bill, to abandon their grandstanding and to support tangible solutions to solve this desperately sad situation before it is too late and before we see more lives lost.