My Lords, our country is diverse, democratic, peaceful and economically successful. We are all rightly proud of it. We want to protect it but it is also no surprise that we are a country experiencing positive net migration, attracting the brightest and the best, those seeking refuge and those in search of a better life. As more people seek to come here and as the global landscape continues to change, we must ensure that the UK remains a country with fair and safe workplaces, access to adequate housing, quality public services and security against changing threats.
Today, we start to debate the Immigration Bill. Immigration legislation is always a contentious subject and I know that we will take great care exploring the detail. However, this Bill has the interests of the country as a whole at its heart. Tackling illegal immigration builds social cohesion, takes pressure off public services and creates the space, politically, socially and economically to help those migrants in need, as we are now doing with refugees from Syria.
One of the principal aims of this Bill is to implement a manifesto pledge to crack down on those individuals who exploit workers in our country and to support working people. The national living wage, welfare reforms and economic growth are just part of our commitment to support workers. In the last quarter, 73.7% of people aged 16 to 64 were in work, the highest employment rate since comparable records began in 1971. However, in the shadows of our economy there are some abuses and exploitation that we must tackle. Some of the victims are migrants, but the criminals exploiting the vulnerable have no regard for their immigration status. We have laws to tackle these abuses and we have agencies to enforce these laws, but we all agree that we could do better. There are multiple enforcement bodies for employment legislation, each with a good reputation and each working well, but they are fragmented, have different lines of accountability and do not always share intelligence. Organised criminals find it too easy to get away with deliberate exploitation of workers. That is why the first thing the Immigration Bill will do is to bring tougher and better co-ordination of enforcement in this field.
Some have said that the Bill will deter victims of labour market abuses from stepping forward and exposing criminals. We believe that nothing could be further from the truth. Illegal workers and the victims of
exploitation are not necessarily the same people. Illegal workers, in most cases, have come to the UK for personal economic gain, circumventing our existing immigration laws. The current offences of entering the UK illegally and breaching immigration conditions date from 1971, but equivalent offences predate even that. Where there are victims, the system is loaded with safeguards. The Modern Slavery Act provides a statutory defence for victims of exploitation. The Crown Prosecution Service and the courts will provide the necessary oversight and support for the enforcement agencies, which will always seek a fair and proportionate outcome.
The Immigration Act 2014 broke new ground on regulating migrant access to services. This House gave it careful scrutiny to ensure that the vulnerable were protected, but also to ensure that the UK remained an attractive destination for international students and investors. We agreed to the creation of the immigration health charge, and to controls on access to bank accounts, driving licences and housing. The right to rent scheme drew considerable debate but was ultimately accepted with additional safeguards and a commitment to a careful, phased implementation. The Government recently published our evaluation of the first phase of that implementation, which I am sure we will debate in detail, but I am confident that the fears of two years ago have not materialised. We worried that international students would not able to secure a home, that the vulnerable would be rendered homeless and that landlords would not understand the documentation; we worried about discrimination. These concerns have been, and continue to be, taken seriously and remain the focus of our efforts to ensure that problems of this nature do not arise as we roll the scheme out across England and then the rest of the UK.
The new reforms to bank accounts and driving licences will further ensure that those who are here unlawfully cannot take advantage of our generous services. We want to stop illegal migrants driving on our roads and to deny them the use of bank accounts. Illegal immigration has a detrimental impact on multiple parts of society, from businesses who are undercut by unscrupulous employers paying low wages to illegal workers, to the threat that can be posed to social cohesion within local communities. Although immigration officers already have existing powers to deal with illegal immigration, we can and must go further. That is why we are providing a basis for public authorities to share documents they hold that may assist the Government in controlling immigration. In doing so, we are simultaneously supporting a collaborative approach to tackling illegal immigration: a vital part of the Government’s objectives. Existing partnerships between immigration enforcement and the police have led to over 3,600 people being removed from the UK, so the benefit of collaborative working is clear. This must be strengthened, which is why we will also ensure that our immigration enforcement warrants are aligned with those of the police. Through this Bill, we will also fulfil the Government’s manifesto commitment to satellite-tag foreign national offenders when they are released on immigration bail, so that we know their whereabouts and can improve public protection.
Another method of combating illegal immigration is to accelerate the removal of those who no longer have the right to be in the UK. Under the 2014 Act, the introduction of the “deport now, appeal later” scheme has had a beneficial operational effect, allowing us to deport hundreds of foreign criminals before they appeal. This is why, in our manifesto, the Government committed to extending this to cover all human rights cases, except asylum claims. I reassure the House that this measure will only be used when requiring someone to appeal from overseas will not cause serious or irreversible harm, or otherwise breach their human rights. The best interests of any children affected will remain a primary consideration for the Home Office before making a decision to exercise this power. We are therefore confident that the extension of this scheme is a proportionate response to maintaining effective immigration control, a position supported by the Court of Appeal’s recent ruling that the Government are generally entitled to proceed on the basis that out-of-country appeals are a fair and effective remedy.
This House will agree that supporting asylum seekers, and ensuring we offer protection to the most vulnerable, is a cornerstone of our democratic and humanitarian society, particularly given recent events. However, the Government believe that it is right to demonstrate our commitment to those who are in search of humanitarian assistance by delivering on our obligation to spend the targeted 0.7% on international aid. We are the only major economy to do that. We are also committed to supporting those affected by the crisis in Syria by delivering £1.1 billion to that region: several multiples of the required share. However, it is not justifiable—or it is difficult to justify—that we spend millions of pounds supporting failed asylum seekers; individuals who have had their claims refused and exhausted their appeal rights, and who should leave the UK where there is no obstacle preventing them. That is why this Government are taking firm action to restrict such support to failed asylum seekers who are destitute and face genuine obstacles to leaving this country.
I can assure your Lordships that there will continue to be safeguards to protect children. In addition to the continued Home Office support that I have just referred to, local authorities will remain able to support families without immigration status who would otherwise be destitute. Some have voiced their concerns that this will simply result in the burdens being transferred to local authorities and the third sector. This is not the intention or the reality. Local authorities do not have a general obligation to accommodate illegal migrants who intentionally make themselves destitute by refusing to leave the UK. Instead, those who do not qualify for Home Office support can, and should, leave the UK and we will work closely with local authorities to encourage and enable them to do so.
This Government have also taken positive steps to relieve some of the burdens which local authorities face to ensure that their finite resources are used effectively. Currently, the framework under which local authorities can support migrants without immigration status is complex and burdensome to administer. This is inefficient and a waste of taxpayers’ money, so the Bill will simplify this process while ensuring that those genuinely in need of support continue to receive it. I
appreciate that many in your Lordships’ House will again be concerned about the impact on children, but I assure the House that local authorities will continue to support children and their families to safeguard and promote the child’s welfare.
A further significant burden that local authorities face is the requirement to pay international tuition fees for adult migrant care leavers, which generally range from £12,000 to £15,000 per year but can be as much as £30,000 per year. This Government are not trying to deny these adult migrants access to a university education but the current position is unfair to other migrants and British citizens, who must qualify under regulations for student loans. So to ensure greater consistency and fairness, the Bill will relieve local authorities of the obligation to pay these fees. Finally, we must make sure that we avoid a repeat of the situation that occurred this summer, where a small number of local authorities incurred substantial financial pressure to care for an unexpected number of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children. We are therefore taking steps to encourage other local authorities to voluntarily accept responsibility for such children while simultaneously making sure that we have the required powers, through the Bill, to transfer responsibility for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children between local authorities.
While illegal immigration poses a significant problem for the UK, it is not the only area which requires greater control. We must ensure that we know who is coming into and leaving the UK, irrespective of whether they are lawfully here or not. A lack of control over our borders poses a significant risk to our national security—a risk we cannot afford to take. So the Bill contains measures to ensure that airlines always present passengers to immigration control, and that the Government automatically apply UN and EU travel bans to stop dangerous individuals coming to our country.
Our manifesto committed to requiring all public sector workers in customer-facing roles to speak fluent English. Some have questioned whether there is a need for this measure. First, it is important to stress that many professions within the public sector already require standards of spoken English and that this measure simply brings the rest into line with the forerunners. I am sure we can all agree that it is essential that all members of the public who need to access public services can understand the information provided to them and be confident of their needs being understood. Not only is the provision important for that purpose but it contributes helpfully to another manifesto commitment, to promote British values within society, and will simultaneously increase the efficiency and effectiveness of public services funded by the taxpayer.
Finally, many businesses in the UK are now choosing to hire overseas workers. This has the knock-on effect of denying our resident workforce the opportunity to secure employment and develop its skills to fill existing shortages. The Government have taken positive steps to reduce unemployment in the UK. For example, in the last quarter, youth unemployment stood at 653,000, down 83,000 from the previous year. But more is
needed. That is why the Bill introduces a charge for employers recruiting from outside the European Economic Area, with the money raised helping to train resident workers and fund apprenticeships in the UK.
There are many speakers down for this debate with immense personal experience in this area, and as always I assure them that the Government will listen very carefully to their contributions and concerns today and of course, as the Bill progresses, to their suggestions for improvements. I am sure we all want to see the continued prosperity of our great nation. We must ensure we continue to welcome the brightest and the best migrants to the UK while also continuing to provide humanitarian relief to those who need it most. However, an inevitable requirement for that continued prosperity is to ensure that the generous and invaluable services the UK provides are safeguarded for those who have a right to be here, as well as for the most vulnerable in our society and those requiring our international humanitarian protection. That is the balance the Bill achieves and I commend it to the House.
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