My Lords, this has certainly been a wide-ranging debate. I intend to concentrate on the regret Motion from the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, which we fully support. We welcome the Motion and the opportunity to discuss matters relating to asylum and immigration in general.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, that while I do not agree with some of his policy prescriptions, I totally agree with him—which is why I was nodding—on the complexity and sometimes impenetrable nature of trying to understand what is actually going on. That is really unhelpful to any of us debating these matters. We all have different perspectives on this, but all of us are seeking an immigration and asylum system that works and is fair. We will debate how that is achieved but, in order to achieve it, we certainly have to understand what is meant and, frankly, that is sometimes quite difficult. I very much agreed with the point the noble Lord made about that.
I say gently to the Minister that it is extremely unhelpful to the whole debate on asylum, immigration and refugees to have the chaos we have at present. The Home Secretary has just resigned. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, just quoted her letter, which appears to suggest that although there was a security or national security breach—we are not sure yet—there was also a furious row in government about what was happening with respect to migration targets, visas, refugees, small boat crossings, et cetera.
Whatever our view, how on earth can we debate these matters without being certain what the Government themselves believe in? What is the Government’s policy? Are the new Immigration Rules, which we have debated and discussed and which my noble friend Lord Dubs referred to, government policy? Does the new Home Secretary agree with the Immigration Rules or will he disagree with the Prime Minister? We just do not know. I am not trying to make a political point. I am making the point that from the point of view of this it is extremely important that the Government sort out what they are saying: otherwise, who can have confidence around any of this?
Indeed, while we have been speaking, there have been rumours that the Chief Whip and Deputy Chief Whip have resigned—which are as yet unconfirmed. Here we are—the noble Lords, Lord Lilley, Lord Horam and Lord Paddick, the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, the noble Earl, Lord Leicester, and my noble friend Lord Dubs—and that is going on all around us. Whatever our view, that just cannot go on.
These are real people, families, refugees and people in need. Even if we think this or that should happen, we cannot have a situation where the Government are falling out among themselves with all that going on. I will just say, because this is the opportunity to do it—I know the Minister will take this—that we simply have to know where we are in order to debate these things.
I found this an interesting debate, which showed the House of Lords at its best. Many of us were Members in the other place, and even where views and arguments clash, out of that comes better public policy, which is what we want.
I want to concentrate on the regret Motion in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hylton. I will reiterate some other points that were made, because it is important for us to put these on the table and then ask some specific questions.
The Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules published in May reflects changes made by the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said, as well as covering a number of other issues. The key change which the regret Motion quite rightly focuses on is to implement the provision in the Nationality and Borders Act to have two tiers of refugees, with the support a person is entitled to based on how they travelled to the UK rather than their actual need. As the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, outlined, can the Minister clarify what support is available to the different groups: the length of stay, the support that they will or will not get, the nature of any detention that they would face should they be put in group 1 rather than group 2, and so on? It is unclear to me, reading the Immigration Rules, what they mean with regard to all that, so we need some clarity. The statement makes some changes to definitions, including changes needed to allow for the effective operation of the migration and economic development partnership with Rwanda, and there is some clarification on the family reunion rules.
This Chamber and His Majesty’s Opposition and others raised detailed and sustained objections to the Nationality and Borders Act during its passage. The Act did nothing to address the backlog of asylum claims and in fact clearly risks making things worse. In our view, it did nothing to create genuine safe routes to prevent dangerous journeys. Instead, it put barriers in the way of refugees fleeing war, persecution and unimaginable situations, as well as victims, including children, who are trying to escape modern slavery.
In this House, multiple votes were won calling for proper planning of safe routes, preventing offshoring, calling for international co-operation—a point my noble friend Lord Dubs made with specific reference to the need to work with France—and ensuring safe family reunion routes for unaccompanied children in refugee camps. As the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said, many children are going missing on arrival in this country; we do not know where they are, which is completely and utterly unacceptable. The House also called for protecting the rights of modern slavery victims, and addressed many other issues. Unfortunately, the elected House, as is its right, insisted on the Act remaining and rejected many of the changes that your Lordships put forward. The regret Motion that the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, has brought forward seeks for us to look again at some of these issues and to raise certain questions.
I point out to the Minister that whatever system you have, there has to be greater effectiveness of the bureaucracy. There is administrative chaos with much of this, and it simply has to be resolved. I will give the Minister some statistics, and perhaps he can say what is being done about it. The number of basic asylum
decisions being taken each year by the Government has collapsed. Decisions have fallen from 28,000 to only 14,000 last year. What an earth is going on? It does not matter what system you have; if the number goes from 28,000 to 14,000, there is a real problem. That is fewer decisions than either Belgium or the Netherlands, let alone Germany or France.
According to the Red Cross in the submission it gave us for this debate, of the applications submitted in quarter 4 of 2021, only 7% received a decision within six months. The equivalent of that was 56% in 2018 and more than 80% in 2015. What on earth is going on? What on earth is happening? Irrespective of the system you have, if you get a collapse in the effectiveness of the administration, nothing will work. All you get is undermining of the system. That backlog costs the taxpayer huge sums of money and prevents the system operating effectively. Can the Minister confirm how long—that is, how many years—the average wait for a basic decision to be made on an asylum claim now is?
The creation of group 2 refugees, who will receive only temporary asylum leave, will require the system not only to make the initial decision but to retake that decision multiple times. What impact assessment have the Government done on that change—the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made this point, I think—where multiple decisions must now be made? What are the Government doing to address their backlog and how will the system, which is already struggling, cope with the additional burden that this measure places on it?
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As the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and others have said, safe routes are the most effective way of preventing dangerous journeys and breaking the business model of the smugglers. Criminal gangs do not care about how a person’s asylum journey ends, nor about the intricacies of UK asylum law; they care only that a person is desperate enough to turn to them in the first place because they feel that they have no other way to seek safety for themselves, their children or their loved ones. Can the Minister give a detailed summary—this would be helpful for all of us—of the safe routes that are available to people to claim asylum in the UK, outside of the resettlement schemes for Afghanistan and Ukraine? The noble Lord, Lord Lilley, pointed to this. What other safe routes are available for anybody seeking asylum in the UK?
For example, how would a woman or a schoolgirl fleeing human rights abuses in Iran, or fleeing for her safety after taking part in the exceptionally brave protests we have all witnessed, be able to travel to the UK safely and in a way that the Home Secretary deems acceptable, and therefore be welcome here? Which safe route is available to her, or is she automatically a group 2 refugee and therefore eligible for deportation to Rwanda? I refer the Minister to the question asked in the other place by Sarah Owen MP:
“Will the Minister give a guarantee that any woman or girl fleeing Iran due to these human rights abuses will not be put on a plane to Rwanda if they seek refuge in this country?”
The Foreign Office Minister, Gillian Keegan, refused to answer. She simply replied:
“We are there to support the rights of women and girls all across the world, and we will continue to do so through our work with the UN and others.”—[Official Report, Commons, 11/10/22; col. 45.]
The question did not ask about women across the world; it asked about the specific example of anyone fleeing Iran because of the situation we have seen there, where many brave women and schoolgirls have been protesting. I think that the country would want to know what happens in that situation; noble Lords may think of other examples. From my reading of the Immigration Rules—they are now law but the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, asks us to regret that—I do not know whether, as things stand, such a women would be subjected to deportation to Rwanda. If not, what safe route is available to them to prevent deportation? There are other examples; that is just one that I have picked out.
How many Afghan refugees are still arriving in the UK in small boats out of desperation because they have been unable to access the official scheme? Does not the Minister share the concern raised by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, that, where a group 2 refugee loses access to family reunion rights, this closes off a safe route for their family members—usually women and children—to seek asylum in the UK and makes it more likely that they will make dangerous journeys in the hands of smugglers?
There are so many different points that can be made about the Immigration Rules that we could discuss this all night, but I want to look at the situation with Rwanda. The Explanatory Memorandum for these changes to the Immigration Rules notes that a definition has been changed to allow
“for the effective operation of the Migration and Economic Development Partnership with Rwanda … Given the anticipated deterrent effect of the Partnership on people smuggling”—
note that the word used is “anticipated”, not “proven”, as the noble Lord, Lord Horam, mentioned—
“this will help to quickly reduce the number of dangerous journeys and save lives.”
Can the Minister confirm that the Permanent Secretary at the Home Office was unable to sign this off due to a lack of evidence that there would be a deterrent effect, that the policy would achieve its main objectives or that the policy would be value for money? In the Explanatory Memorandum to what is now law, which the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, seeks to regret, does not the Home Office’s own Permanent Secretary disagree with the memorandum’s explanation of the Rwanda scheme? Has anything changed with respect to that or is it still a position that the then Home Secretary ignored?
These are significant concerns that we keep coming back to the House with. Policy is being made without evidence that it will work. There is administrative chaos which will prevent any system from working effectively, and the very real problems for many people seeking asylum in our country are being left unanswered. It is not good enough, and the Government need to get a grip.