UK Borders Bill

My Lords, I am glad to have an opportunity to participate in this debate about another immigration Bill in the rather squalid history of UK immigration control. It has been a privilege to listen to so many well informed and compassionate contributions. I add the word ““squalid”” to the list of adjectives given to the House by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester, whose contribution reminded me that we have not lost our moral compass and that there is a host of people who know how unjust we have become in our treatment of other needy human beings. I should like to concentrate in my remarks on some of the matters that were raised about this Bill by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which I am a member. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Judd, for referring to so much of the committee’s work. I shall address the automatic deportation of foreign prisoners, which, fortunately, is not quite automatic; the destitution of failed asylum seekers, a few of whom, fortunately, are to be a bit less destitute; and the treatment of victims of trafficking, which, unfortunately, is to remain unchanged by the Bill. Let me begin with foreign prisoners, which is a sad story from beginning to end. If the beginning is the point when the Home Office realised it had failed to deport, as it should have done, some prisoners who were not British passport holders and had committed serious offences, then the end is this Bill. In this discussion, I shall try to use non-emotive and, I hope, accurate language rather than the language of the Bill which refers to ““foreign criminals””. I was quite surprised to hear the Minister use that term. The whole issue of foreign prisoners has been a gross administrative failure and has led to considerable injustice and inhumanity. One needs only to look at the report by Anne Owers, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, entitled, Foreign National Prisoners: A Follow-up Report, of January 2007. She notes the consequences of the administrative failure to deport those who should have been deported and the panic that struck the Home Office. She says: "““As a consequence, all foreign nationals were assumed to be deportable. Foreign nationals who had been in open conditions, or were on licence in the community, were returned to closed prisons, even if their behaviour had been exemplary. The trawl was so undiscriminating that it included some British citizens (who are not deportable in any circumstances), Irish and EEA nationals (who are deportable only in limited circumstances), and those who had committed only minor offences, but had lengthy residence and family ties only in the UK””." She says that, "““foreign nationals, suddenly and unexpectedly threatened with deportation … found it impossible to find out what was happening to them, and were held in prisons and immigration removal centres far past their sentence expiry dates, even those who were desperate to return home. Their presence significantly contributed to the prison overcrowding crisis of late 2006””." The chief inspector’s report chronicles the anxieties, uncertainty, frustration and even despair among foreign national prisoners. One stark indicator of their predicament was the increased prevalence of self-harm and more suicide attempts. She cites two cases, one of a man on hunger strike because he wanted to return home and was still in prison six months after his sentence expired, and the other, "““a refugee, desperate not to return home, who was only told that he would not be deported on the day his sentence expired, and shortly after he had tried to hang himself””." The system, says Anne Owers, was one, "““whose dysfunctionality had serious personal costs for foreign nationals, and practical consequences for prisons and immigration removal centres””." I suggest that this whole affair is dysfunctional. It is also an example of an unacceptable failure to treat people as individual human beings with rights, needs and maybe a contribution to make, rather than as a political problem. The Bill does not improve the situation, it makes it worse. The regime it introduces is rigid, harsh and will lead to many injustices. What, for example, would happen under the new regime to the 23 year-old young man from Thailand called Sakchai Makao who had lived in Shetland since he was 10? He had served a prison sentence of 15 months for setting fire to something while he was drunk. He had represented Scotland in international athletics competitions. When he was released from prison, he got a good job at the sports centre in Lerwick. He was not just a ““foreign criminal””. He was also a sportsman, a member of a family, a worker, a taxpayer, a member of a community and a constituent, whose MP was very active on his behalf. Nevertheless, he was suddenly arrested and whipped off to a prison in England prior to deportation to Thailand, where he had no one and did not speak the language. I understand that 20,000 people live in Shetland. Nine thousand of them signed a petition to get him released on bail and sent back to Scotland. He appealed against deportation and was allowed to stay. What would happen to him under the Bill, and any other similar young people convicted even of shoplifting or graffiti spraying? Is he the sort of person we do not want in the UK under any circumstances? I hope very much to get a response from the Minister on that question. There is another problem. The Joint Committee on Human Rights has reported on the Bill and has raised a major human rights concern in relation to people convicted of criminal offences who do not have British nationality. The report says: "““The Bill’s provisions on automatic deportation of foreigners convicted of criminal offences appear to the Committee to give rise to a risk of prolonged post-sentence immigration detention””." Indeed, this prolonged pre-deportation detention has been a matter of great concern to the members of independent monitoring boards. I declare an interest as the president of the Association of Members of Independent Monitoring Boards. The latest report from Lincoln prison says: "““Despite the fact that a representative from the Immigration Service attends the prison each week, there are still too many prisoners of this category whose sentence has expired and should have been deported””." The report from Holloway prison speaks of foreign nationals being held in prison beyond the end of their sentence, and being limited in their regime while in prison. The Joint Committee recommends that the Bill should be amended to lay down a specific timeframe within which the Secretary of State must decide whether a deportation order is required. I hope that that recommendation will be considered. I turn to the destitution of asylum seekers, which I anticipate we will hear more about in a moment. The Joint Committee on Human Rights recently reported on the treatment of asylum seekers. I recommend that report to anyone who was surprised at my use of the word ““squalid”” at the beginning of my remarks. We reported that we had been persuaded by the evidence that the Government have been practising a deliberate policy of destitution in relation to asylum seekers and that such deliberate use of inhumane treatment is unacceptable. The Minister will be glad to hear that the committee welcomed the provision for asylum seekers to receive subsistence support pending final determination of their claim but suggested that more is needed if asylum seekers, including asylum-seeking children, are not subjected to inhumane and degrading treatment but are treated with common humanity. Finally, let me say a word about human trafficking. The Joint Committee welcomes the Bill’s extension of the scope of existing human trafficking offences, but is disappointed that the opportunity has not been taken to introduce more effective protection for the victims of trafficking. In our recent report on human trafficking, we concluded that the current level of protection provided to victims is far from adequate from a human rights perspective. The committee argues that the Bill should be amended to improve protection for trafficking victims by providing, for example, that where there are reasonable grounds to believe that a person is a victim, that person shall not be removed from the UK until the process for identifying whether they are a victim is complete. We argued for a recovery and reflection period of three months to be granted to a person who has been identified as a victim of trafficking, during which time immigration enforcement measures should not be taken against them. We also argued for renewable residence permits of up to six months’ duration be granted to victims of trafficking. I should be grateful to hear the Minister’s views on these proposals, which would mostly apply to women who have been trafficked into this country for the sex trade. I hope very much that the Bill can be improved considerably in Committee and that it will be the last of this sort of legislation.