Yes, I can certainly undertake to do that.
Furthermore, I can confirm that under Article 20 of the treaty the agreement may be amended at any time by mutual agreement between the parties. Agreed amendments shall enter into force on the date of receipt of the last notification by the parties that their internal procedures for entry into force have been completed. To be clear, any amendments made to the Rwanda treaty would need to comply with CRaG.
On the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, as noble Lords will know, the department carefully considers each report’s findings and these are often complex matters. The Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration monitors and reports on the efficiency and effectiveness of the immigration, asylum, nationality and customs functions carried out.
I appreciate that the noble Lord said this is not about getting into the rights and wrongs, but I am afraid that is not the case; it is about getting into the rights and wrongs of why the contract with Mr Neal was terminated. I will repeat what I said earlier in a Question. He released sensitive and misleading information from unpublished
reports well within the time commitment for publication, so the Home Office did not have time to fact-check and redact inappropriate material. That is germane to this debate.
On the number of reports that were released last week, yes, there were 13 and they were released at speed, as Parliament requested and demanded. In those 13 reports, there were 27 recommendations; 18 have been accepted, eight were partially accepted and one was not accepted. I rehearsed earlier today the arguments about the accuracy of some of those reports, and I therefore think that that is a high number in the circumstances. On the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, the Home Secretary has committed to look into appointing an interim chief inspector, and I cannot improve on his words at the moment.
However, going back to the point that the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, made, the MEDP with Rwanda has its own independent monitoring regime in the form of the monitoring committee. This committee will have the power to set its own priority areas for monitoring and have unfettered access for the purposes of completing assessment and reports—we have discussed that at some length.
I agree with my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth; he is completely right about his reference to Article 15. As the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, pointed out, Article 16(5) says:
“The co-chairs may set terms of reference for the Monitoring Committee in addition to but not contrary to those provided in Article 15 of this Agreement”.
I will not read out all 10 paragraphs of Article 15, but they are very comprehensive indeed.
The need for a statement on the impact of this Act, before it comes into force, is simply not necessary. As we set out at length in earlier debates, the monitoring committee has been appointed; it will provide real-time comprehensive monitoring—with an initial period of enhanced monitoring—of the end-to-end relocation and claims process, to ensure compliance with the standards agreed in the standard operating procedures and the treaty obligations. The monitoring committee will undertake daily monitoring of the partnership for at least the first three months, to ensure rapid identification of and response to any shortcomings. This enhanced phase will ensure that the comprehensive monitoring and reporting takes place in real time, and the monitoring committee will ensure that there is a daily presence of the support team on the ground through this enhanced phase.
On that basis, I urge noble Lords not to press their amendments.