UK Borders Bill

I see that I am more sympathetic to the Government than most of my hon. Friends; plus ça change. Let me move hastily on to the section dealing with immigration officers and detention at ports. We support the extension of powers given to immigration officers, but it is inadequate to meet the scale of the problems faced at our ports and airports. The Minister had a difficult time from hon. Members on both sides of the House about that set of proposals, and rightly so. It seems a small gesture in the direction of toughening up the current regime and nothing like enough to meet the scale of the crisis. There are obvious questions about the Government’s proposal itself, such as whether three hours is long enough, and what happens if there are multiple incidents and it is impossible to get a police officer there in time. One can imagine serious multiple incidents happening at a busy port and the officer not being able to get there within three hours. Presumably, people will be let go. There is a wider point, which the Minister did not address, made by hon. Members on both sides of the House, about whether it would be much better to combine the powers of immigration officers, police officers and customs officers and use the Bill as the vehicle for bringing a proper border police into our law and order system. He will have heard in the course of the debate that that is not just Conservative party policy; it is also Liberal Democrat policy, and has been recommended by the Select Committee on Home Affairs and by distinguished Labour Members, like the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay). Altogether, the Minister is more or less on his own in preferring his own tinkering to the radical change that hon. Members on both sides of the House have recommended. I urge the Minister to reconsider. Even if he wants to reject the advice of those of us on both sides of the House who want him to change his mind, perhaps he will listen to senior police officers. Sir Chris Fox, as president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, in 2005 said:"““I think we should have a group of people that are made up of Police Officers, Special Branch, Immigration Officers and Customs, who have a total responsibility for all our points of entry.””" Sir Ian Blair said on February 6 2005:"““When we got into the debate about SOCA it surprised me that we did not have a national border police.””" This is as near as we are going to get to a consensus on any aspect of immigration and asylum policy, and yet the Government are stubbornly rejecting it.