UK Borders Bill

I would not say that I was enthusiastic about seeing the Bill, because over the past few years there has been so much legislation on immigration and asylum that I sometimes think the Home Office should be banned from introducing any more legislation for three or four years—Ministers might enjoy that. I can understand the reasoning behind many parts of the Bill, but I have a real problem with the lack of detail in it about what will happen and how it will work. I am referring to the powers of arrest for immigration officers, powers on illegal working and powers on deportation. In many respects, how the Bill works will become clear only when we see the regulations. An enormous amount is left to regulations, which is a trend that I see in more and more Bills now and which I do not particularly like, because it means that often we do not know precisely how a Bill will work and what it will do. I understand the point that we do not want too much detail in the Bill, because if we try to put every single dot and comma in the Bill, the tiniest change means coming back for primary legislation. However, in far too many Bills such an enormous amount is left to regulations that we end up relying on assurances from Ministers about how a Bill will work, despite what appear to be wide powers in the measure. I am not casting aspersions on the good faith of Ministers, but that does mean that there are no guarantees for the future. In addition, of course, regulations cannot be amended. We might think that 90 per cent. of a regulation is acceptable but 10 per cent. is a problem, and there will be no way to amend it as we can amend the primary legislation. All the way through the Bill, it is the lack of detail and what will come along when we see the regulations that concerns me. I can understand the reasoning for the first few clauses on immigration officers’ powers of detention. Let us say that a British citizen was trying to leave the country and there is a warrant for that person’s arrest or that person was known to have committed a crime. If an immigration officer was the only person at the port and no police were there, he could not stop and detain that person. I understand that a loophole exists, but I am concerned that the rules must be clear on immigration officers’ accountability and the routes for complaint or challenge against the use of their powers. The suggestion that PACE should apply has been made already. What happens when the immigration officer tries to detain someone? Does he have the power to question that person? If so, would that happen under caution? How would that relate to PACE? It is important that we get this right, because the Bill includes a criminal offence of obstructing the immigration officer in the carrying out of that function. In effect, there is a criminal offence of not co-operating with the immigration officer, so it is important that we know exactly what the rules are, what the powers are, what the limitations on them are and how they can be challenged if they are used inappropriately. Clearly, the clauses on biometric registration are steps on the way to ID cards. We know from the debate on the Identity Cards Bill that it was always intended that one of the first groups of people to be subject to ID card legislation would be foreign nationals. There is no surprise in that, but some of the questions that now arise are similar to those that arose about the Identity Cards Act 2006. It is not clear to me from the Bill where the data that are collected will be stored. Will we have a card with a chip on which the information is stored, so that the information is carried around on the card? Or will we have, as we were promised with the Identity Cards Bill, a major database behind the card? That is important; some of us who have real problems with ID cards would feel less uncomfortable with a chip on the card, rather than one with a big database behind it. The same applies with the Bill and we have questions about who will have access to the data. What will be the data protection regime? Issues relating to children have been mentioned. When we debated the Identity Cards Bill, we were specifically told that there was no intention to introduce ID cards for children under the age of 16, but there is a specific reference in clause 6 to the possibility of the registration of under-16s, despite what was said earlier. Some of the powers look extremely wide and we need to know what they mean and how they will be used. For instance, clause 7 will allow the consequences of a failure to comply with biometric registration"““to be at the discretion of the Secretary of State.””" That is a very wide power: the Secretary of State can impose a penalty on someone for not complying with the registration, but there is no indication of what that penalty might or might not be. A few days ago, I raised with the Minister the question of how the card will be used. For instance, could the police stop someone and ask them for their card? The Minister has assured me in writing––and mentioned earlier today––that that would not be the case. However, we would assume that an immigration officer could ask for the card and that it will be asked for in a variety of circumstances. Let us suppose that there was a raid on a factory where it was thought that a significant number of employees were working illegally—the sort of thing that we know happens. People in that factory may require the card; others will not: people who are British citizens but who happen to have come to this country as migrants. We must be sure that the checking of such people, who might include British citizens, will be done with sensitivity. I am not clear either, given the Bill’s phrasing, exactly who in the end will have the biometric card. The Bill talks about people who are subject to immigration control. It appears that that will be interpreted to include people who have indefinite leave to remain, on the ground that it is possible for that person’s indefinite leave to be revoked at some point. For instance, if someone with indefinite leave stays out the country for two years or more, the indefinite leave lapses. Is it the intention that everyone who has indefinite leave to remain but has not then acquired British citizenship will be brought into the ambit of the Bill? That is a very large number of people and it will include many family members of people who are British citizens. After living in this country for years and years and having indefinite leave to remain, they would feel some resentment if they were asked to sign up to a biometric card on the ground that they were foreign nationals. I can understand perfectly well that people should be able to prove that they have a right to work and to gain access to a benefit or a public service. It may well be that a single secure document, rather than the vast number of documents that can be used now, would be a considerable help in that respect. I have certainly come across cases—I am sure that other hon. Member have, too—that involve people who find it difficult to convince an employer that they have the right to work, because they have a three-year-old status letter from the Home Office that is getting tatty and does not look like the genuine article. I have also dealt with constituents who have had problems proving to the Benefits Agency that they have a right to gain access to benefits. Responsible employers are reluctant to employ people whom they think might be subject to immigration control or perhaps do not have the right to work. I can understand that such things can be a two-way street and that people could benefit from being able to produce that secure document. I am also concerned about some points that were raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Denham) about the consequences of a move towards cracking down on illegal working. I agree with absolutely everything that he said about the employers whom we should be targeting. Those people will not just be employing illegal workers; they will not be paying VAT, national insurance or tax properly, and so on. There is no question but that we should be targeting those people, but we will inevitably throw up conceivably very large numbers of people who are working illegally and people who have overstayed—some of whom have been here a long time and have families, mortgages and children in school—and we must have some way to deal with those people if were not going to create chaos. Chaos will certainly be caused in their lives if they are suddenly told after years of working that they are no longer able to do so. My right hon. Friend said that he would rule out an amnesty because it would become a magnet. I have heard that sort of argument before, but it does not necessarily convince me if the rules are made clear enough. For example, in recent years, there was effectively an amnesty for asylum seeker families with children who had been here a certain length of time and whose children had been born before a particular date. I do not see any evidence at all that that led to lots more people coming to this country with their families to seek asylum because they thought that there might be another amnesty in two or three years. I am not necessarily convinced that an amnesty has to act as a magnet if the rules are made clear.