Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Bill

I thank the Minister for the explanation on the four government amendments. She rightly described Amendments Nos. 48 and 49 as dealing with orders under Clause 20. Amendments Nos. 50 and 51 deal with ““Discrimination: code of practice””. In a way, the Government had to bring these amendments forward for the simple reason that the House of Lords Delegated Powers Committee said in its 10th report that provisions prescribing the maximum amount of the penalty should be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. We will comment briefly on Amendments Nos. 48 and 49. Very little detail of the scheme is given in the Bill. While provisions such as Clause 15(7) appear detailed, they merely set out non-exhaustive lists of what secondary legislation may contain and thus provide little real guidance. For that reason, and given that the Government have agreed to make orders setting the maximum amount of penalty subject to the affirmative resolution procedure, there may be a case for urging them to make all the prescribed requirements, and the code on setting the level of penalty, subject to that procedure. That would ensure that all those provisions fell to be debated together. We also wish to see the affirmative procedure proposed under Clause 23 on discrimination. The risks of discrimination associated with these provisions are enormous. That was the Labour Party’s primary reason, when it was in Opposition, for objecting to the current offence for employers as set out in Section 8 of the 1996 Act. The current draft code offers little comfort and appears to do little to obviate the risk of discrimination. It would be helpful if the Minister could indicate the timetable and what she has in mind for the new equality commission. I understand also that there is a separate move by the Commission for Racial Equality to set up a separate commission dealing with race issues. I assure her that we stand by the provisions of the Equality Bill and would have nothing to do with the CRE’s new proposal. It simply takes us back to 1965 and 1966 when there were two separate bodies which we spent years bringing together. In these amendments, it is important to ensure that any provisions established under this legislation will be subject to discrimination provision by the Commission for Racial Equality or the equality commission, when it is set up.