My Lords, I will speak to the proposition that Clause 57 should not stand part of the Bill. Before I do, let me say that there are various myths arising around this Bill, one of which is that the Government are going to deport vast numbers of people, and another is that speeches from this side of the Committee are repetitious. I think it is regrettable that that sort of claim is being made. I referred at the beginning of proceedings today to the fact that this Bill got almost no scrutiny in the other place. As Dr Hannah White, the director of the Institute for Government, said last night on the radio, it has just come to expect that we will do that job.
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Yet when we try to do our job, we are abused, bullied and intimidated, quite honestly, as we were until 4.20 am last Thursday. It would be perfectly possible to have an agreed, more rational timetable for this Bill. For instance, I do not know why we are starting at 11 am on Wednesday when we will have only eight groups left to do. Quite honestly, I do not appreciate the behaviour of the Government over this Bill.
Anyway, Clause 57 expands the inadmissibility provisions generally, not just in respect of individuals caught by Clause 2, so that non-EU EEA countries and, most notably, Albania are added to a list of so-called safe countries of origin. Secondly, the Secretary of State may add to this list relatively easily. Again, who is taking back control? It is certainly not Parliament. Thirdly, human rights claims as well as asylum claims made by individuals from listed countries must be declared inadmissible. All this gives rise to serious risks that individuals will be exposed to refoulement.
I agree with the objection to putting Albania on to the list of safe states. A large number of well-founded asylum claims by Albanian nationals are likely not to be considered. The figures are, apparently, that the initial grant rate for Albanian women last year was 85% and for Albanian children 87%, so to say that there does not seem to be any validity to Albanian claims does not seem to be borne out by the figures.
The UNHCR makes a very interesting and important point, which certainly resonates with my experiences as an MEP working in part on immigration and asylum matters. When we were in the EU, the interpretive principles that were developed concerning asylum seekers from EU countries were confined to EU member states. The presumptions of safety reflected their inclusion in a shared system of refugee and human rights law. That is what we did. We all participated, including in the Council of Ministers in which this country was
represented by government Ministers, in the establishment of this common body of law that not only set high minimum standards but was known to British courts, was published in English and applied throughout the EU.
Deviations from those standards were visible to UK courts and decision-makers, as they could be seen in the judgments of the European Court of Justice and in procedures under the treaties under Article 7—for instance, against Hungary or Poland. It was kind of known what the situation was in the countries which were on the safe country list, but once you expand the list beyond the EU, countries may be included whose laws and systems are not as effective at protecting fundamental rights, and this may not be fully understood by British decision-making. There is a clear risk that the presumption that the country’s human rights system is so effective that little individualised scrutiny is required will not be correct.
Clause 57(2) renders inadmissible all human rights claims from citizens of listed countries. It may be contrary to Article 3 of the refugee convention and Article 14 of the ECHR because human rights claims, unlike asylum claims, are not necessarily linked to or determined by the country from which they arise. If you have a young child separated from their parents, it is not going to have less of an adverse impact on that child simply because the parent faces removal to a country within the EEA or Albania; that has nothing to do with the human rights case that the child would try to make. So, basically, Clause 57 is not well drafted.
Lastly, making all asylum claims from Albanian citizens inadmissible appears to conflict with the views of the UK’s country of origin information list, where reference is made to a Home Office Country Policy and Information Note: Human Trafficking, Albania, February 2023. There are valid concerns even from within the Home Office that Albania is not a safe country for everybody, although it may be for some people. Therefore, some individuals or groups of Albanian citizens may be at real risk of persecution, so the blanket approach of Clause 57 is completely inappropriate if we are really going to respond to human rights claims.