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7.39 pm
Ms Roseanna Cunningham (Perth and Kinross): I hope to be very brief.
It is most instructive that any Bill of the type before us introduced by the Government never appears to start with any delineation of the rights of the individuals who will be affected by it. That exposes the moral vacuum at the heart of so much of what the Government are about. Nowhere in the British constitution are rights ever defined. That is why it is possible for proposals to be made which are as thoroughly disgraceful as those in the Bill.
I find almost the entire Bill objectionable, but I shall restrict my remarks to clauses 9 and 10. However, before doing so, I shall respond to one or two of the arguments of Conservative Members, especially about clause 4. They tried to tug on our heart-strings, describing the awful prospect and sight of the poor people--I think one phrase was "Chinese peasants"--who had been so awfully defrauded and the promises that they were given, before they were sent to this country, by people who took their money and documents from them.
As most other Members of the House must have done, I have received a briefing from the Immigration Law Practitioners Association, which says that currently:
Clauses 9 and 10, regarding the restrictions on housing assistance and child benefit, need to be considered against a background of the recent proposed changes to social security entitlement of asylum seekers. Many hon. Members will also have received briefings about that.
I understand that the proposals will mean that from 8 January 1996, the regulations will remove the right to benefits from all those people who apply for asylum after their entry to the United Kingdom, and will remove the right to benefits from asylum seekers who exercise their right of appeal against a decision that has gone against them.
It is true that, currently, only about 30 per cent. of those people seeking asylum make an application at their point of entry, but it is equally true that the vast majority of the remainder apply within only one week of their entry, and an overwhelming number of asylum seekers arriving in the United Kingdom arrive with the precise intention of seeking asylum.
There may be many reasons why people do not immediately apply, not least of which must be confusion in their minds. How on earth are people in that position expected to know the UK requirements in advance? Perhaps we shall be reassured that information is helpfully handed out to potential asylum seekers in their country of origin, but I suspect not. It is outrageous to suggest that those people who do not apply at the point of entry are, by definition, not genuine. That cannot be decided until an application is processed.
I draw attention to the fact that it has been known for circumstances in a person's home country to change while they are in this country, perfectly legitimately, as students. I well remember being at university with Cambodian students who started their degree course in the full expectation of being able to return home at the end of it and with every wish to do so, but who were prevented from doing so by the unfortunate activities of the Khmer Rouge and ultimately had to seek asylum elsewhere. That type of thing can happen and needs to be taken into account, but the Bill does not provide for it.
At present, there is a wait of about eight months for an asylum decision to be made, and I understand that permission to work is not given until six months after the application is made. However, there is no guarantee of work, and work will be even less likely if clause 8 becomes law. That has been mentioned especially by Opposition Members.
As at 8 January 1996, about 13,000 asylum seekers plus families will lose all benefits. Then, presumably, many of them will lose their homes. The Refugee Council has warned of that and of the subsequent pressure on local authorities. As I understand it, the Scottish Refugee Council has been thrown into complete disarray, trying to to cope with the confusion that that will create and the difficulties that it will cause for that organisation. Destitution will be the result of clauses 9 and 10 added to the regulations that have already been passed but have yet to be brought into force.
The only relevant status for housing assistance should be the housing status of the individual, not their immigrant designation or other such status.
On the face of it, I find clause 10 especially invidious as it may well result in the removal of child benefit from immigrants, affecting British-born children of immigrants, because it is their parents who have to apply.
Mr. Deva:
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Ms Cunningham:
I am sorry, but time is so short that I will not give way.
Clauses 9 and 10 are vague and, in spite of the assurances of Conservative Members, they are widely seen to be vague. Most people who have read the briefings will know that those are the two clauses which cannot be briefed on in any detail because of their vagueness, and which therefore give rise to enormous concern. Neither the Refugee Council nor immigration lawyers specialising in that type of work find those clauses especially clear.
The potential powers are wide ranging and potentially exclude whole groups of people already settled in the United Kingdom. In effect, it appears that the Government intend to starve people out of the country. Those are
disgraceful measures, directed not only at the most vulnerable group of new asylum seekers, but at very many others, leading to incalculable insecurity and, most of all, financial insecurity.
In his letter of 20 November 1995, the Home Secretary said:
Hon. Members might be forgiven for receiving the impression that the problems to which the Home Secretary refers have far less to do with illegal immigration and bogus asylum seekers and everything to do with the problems likely to be experienced by Conservatives at the next general election.
The use of legislation such as this Bill for purely political reasons draws attention to the desperate need for a written constitution and a Bill of Rights in this country, which may be used as a starting point and a benchmark. Right now we are creating groups of people with no apparent rights. In effect, we shall create a category of non-person.
I shall make some more general remarks about the things that the Bill represents, some of which were mentioned by Opposition Members. To me, "immigrant" is not a dirty word; it simply means someone who has moved from one part of the world to another. However, the Government's attitude and the rhetoric of some of their supporters are having the effect that the word "immigrant" is on the way to being regarded and used as an insult. That is most unfortunate.
I spent 16 years as an immigrant in Australia and I am a descendant of immigrants in a previous wave of immigration to this country. I and other Members of the House who are in a similar position would be appalled to hear that word, which historically has been used with a certain pride, treated in that fashion and to hear people using it in the pejorative sense in which it is used. I know that some Ministers are in the same position, although perhaps that is not an especially good advertisement for immigration.
People from this country have been welcomed elsewhere when they went in search of a better life and better economic circumstances. We should in turn welcome those from elsewhere, because immigrants help a culture to grow and change, and without growth and change a culture will die.
That anti-immigrant attitude is especially unfortunate. People in the House may be interested to know that in the by-election campaign which resulted in my being here I was attacked openly by Members of the Conservative party because my fitness to stand for election as a Member of Parliament in this country was brought into question as a result of my having spent my time between the ages of 8 and 25 in Australia.
The right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) is right to paraphrase Pastor Niemoller and say that once one starts that ball rolling, it does not stop. I was on the receiving end of it in Perth and Kinross, and I am certain that the experiences of many other people in this country would have been far worse than that.
Mr. James Couchman (Gillingham):
I begin my short contribution to the debate by stating my unequivocal support for my right hon. and learned Friend's proposals to close loopholes in, and to speed up the implementation of, the law as it relates to asylum. It must be right to seek to investigate the claims of asylum applicants, and, where appropriate, to allow the appeal procedure to operate as speedily as possible. It is not acceptable that people should be locked up for many months in Rochester prison, which is situated just outside my constituency. Those people have committed no crime, but a purely bureaucratic process keeps them incarcerated.
However, the delay and obfuscation tactics employed by many who are patently economic migrants must come to an end. If it takes the withdrawal of our generous social security benefits and special housing treatment to encourage migrants not to seek to frustrate the process, so be it. Our European Union partners in France, Belgium, Holland and Germany have adopted a much tougher regime, and their rates of asylum seekers are falling fast, while ours are rocketing. The number of people seeking asylum in the United Kingdom has risen from 28,000 in 1993 to 32,800 in 1994, and we have a staggering estimate of 40,000 this year.
I was astonished to hear my right hon. and learned Friend say that some 70 per cent.--or 28,000 people this year--of asylum seekers do not apply at a port of entry. Many of them are students, those whose entry clearances have expired and are therefore overstayers, or they are simply illegal immigrants whose presence has been detected by the immigration service. Almost none of those people can have any claim to deserving political asylum under the 1951 United Nations convention. In short, they are making a mockery of this country's generous welcome to people who have come to the United Kingdom to escape persecution--from the Huguenots to the Jews and the Ugandan Asians, to give just three examples.
Almost the only reasons why the status of students or visitors may change to entitle them to consideration for asylum is a major upheaval or revolution in their country, or if they have indulged in political or terrorist activity that is hostile to the Government of their country which might render them liable to prosecution and conviction upon their return to that country.
I must express my concern at that point, because I do not believe that it is appropriate for visitors to our shores to abuse our welcome by indulging in acts which, if committed overseas by one of our citizens, would render him or her liable to the rigour of the law upon his or her return to the United Kingdom. It seems to me that preaching sedition or insurrection against one's country while enjoying the protection of our freedoms is an abuse of our hospitality.
"It is a matter of law that entry by deception can include deception by third parties of which the entrant is entirely innocent"
and that clause 4, as it stands, introduces strict liability for that criminal offence, which is to say that there would be no normal requirement of any criminal intention unless there is some further definition or defence that we know nothing about. In those circumstances, Conservative Members should realise that those poor Chinese peasants about whom they are so worried are likely to be prosecuted for the fraud that is perpetrated on them by other people. That is a disgrace.
"We face very real problems. The proposals outlined in this letter are a measured response to those problems."
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