I would have liked to say it was a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis), but unfortunately I cannot.
I rise to speak to new clause 29, which stands in my name and in the name of right hon. and hon. Friends. I share the wish of hon. Members across the Committee to see an end to small boats crossing the channel, but the Bill is an affront to the values of my party and of so many people in Wales and across the UK. It is at odds with the objectives and the spirit of the international human rights treaties to which the UK is a signatory. It is contrary to the Welsh Government’s wish for Wales to be a nation of sanctuary. It is contrary to the democratically expressed will of the people of Wales, and if we had our own way it would not apply in our country.
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My party has therefore tabled new clause 29, which would require the UK and Welsh Governments jointly to produce guidance setting out how measures under the Bill could be exercised consistently with the Welsh Government’s commitment to make Wales a nation of sanctuary. It would also require that no such guidance be published unless approved by Senedd Cymru.
The Welsh Government have written to the UK Government to say that they believe legislative consent will most likely be needed for the Bill, as it will encroach on Welsh devolved law. That is just one example; the Bill also includes provisions to allow for the transfer of responsibility for children from local authorities to the
Home Office, which may well lead to children who are being cared for in Wales being summarily deported on turning 18. That would undermine the aims of Welsh legislation such as the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014, which sets out the responsibilities of local authorities to unaccompanied asylum-seeking children in Wales.
We have a particular concern about clause 12, which would allow the Secretary of State to detain refugees and asylum seekers essentially indefinitely. The Government have made it clear that they will be looking to use military camps as one source of accommodation. There is evidence of the danger of detaining refugees en masse in that way, as we saw with the use of the Penally camp in Pembrokeshire: a substandard and run-down site was used to house hundreds of asylum seekers over the winter of 2020. There were appalling conditions for them, there was huge concern locally and it was a lightning rod for the very worst of the extreme right, who travelled to Penally from afar to demonstrate and cause huge disruption. Are the Government really heedless of this danger? [Interruption.] As heedless as the Minister is of my speech, apparently.
I pay tribute to the people of Llanilltud Fawr, also known as Llantwit Major, who turned out in their hundreds last weekend to assert our welcome for refugees in Wales and our abhorrence of the hard right. The people of Llanilltud Fawr peacefully saw off the pathetic rabble of about 20 right-wing strangers who had been bussed in, ostensibly to protest about housing Ukrainian refugees locally. The people of Llanilltud Fawr and the people of Wales are proud to live in a gwlad lloches—a country of refuge—and I applaud their peaceful demonstration to reject the vicious and unrepresentative few who seek to hijack the issue for their own political ends.
Contrary to the title of this Bill, nobody is illegal. Claiming asylum is an international human right. Desperate people arriving in the UK by whatever means they can, because there are no safe routes, should not be criminalised. I could say much more, but for now let me assure the Committee and the people listening and watching at home that my party will oppose this vicious, unfair and damaging Bill again in the Division Lobby tonight.