| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Immigration Appeals
9.13 pm
Mr. Simon Hughes (Southwark, North and Bermondsey): I beg to move,
- That the Immigration Appeals (Family Visitor) (No. 2) Regulations 2000 (S.I., 2000, No. 2446), dated 11th September 2000, a copy of which was laid before this House on 13th September, be revoked.
The Conservative Government led by the right hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major) abolished the right of those who had applied for visas to enter this country to appeal against rejection. That caused widespread disapproval, dissatisfaction and anger. Understandably, the Labour Opposition, like the Liberal Democrats, were committed to restoring the right of appeal and hoped that the result of the general election would mean that that could be achieved.
When the debate took place in the context of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, the Labour Government confirmed that they would restore the right of appeal. It was restored, but neither the Labour manifesto nor debates on the Immigration and Asylum Bill revealed that it would be restored at what would prove to be a very high price for many people. The right of appeal costs £500, payable in advance at the external port of entry, where the application is made. It is only refundable if the appeal succeeds. The applicant is therefore required to turn up and pay the money in, for example, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the Caribbean or west Africa for the right of appeal.
An even quicker appeal, with no chance to put the case in person, costs the lower fee of £150.
Mr. Peter Bottomley (Worthing, West): Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the original proposal, which was made in early August, was for a higher sum, and that the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux said that it received a copy of the draft regulations on 3 August and that comments had to be made by 14 August?
Mr. Hughes: I confirm that the Government began consultation at the end of July, asked for responses by 14 August, and proposed slightly higher sums, which, even in that short period, elicited general opposition from all those who advise on immigration, asylum and nationality matters in this country and are funded and recognised by the Government. I shall return to the intervention of the hon. Member for Worthing, West (Mr. Bottomley) shortly.
All the responses to consultation had to be in by the middle of August. The Government introduced the new regime through an order that took effect on 13 September and came into operation at the beginning of October. It is being debated in Parliament only because the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor), the hon. Member for Worthing, West and my hon. Friends and I registered our dissent by requesting discussion of the statutory instrument on the Floor of the House. However, there was widespread unhappiness in all parties and outside the House.
Since then, three events of note have happened. Two early-day motions have been tabled by hon. Gentlemen in the Labour party--
Dr. Lynne Jones (Birmingham, Selly Oak): And hon. Ladies.
Mr. Hughes: The lead name on each has been that of an hon. Gentleman, but of course they were supported by hon. Ladies. One was tabled by the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr. Khabra) and the other by the hon. Member for St. Helens, South (Mr. Bermingham). Both hon. Members are present. Those early-day motions are supported by 65 Labour Members, who protest at the charges that are in force as a result of the order. I am also aware that there is a significant amount of dissatisfaction among Conservative Members. [Interruption.] Although many Labour colleagues are present, that is not true of Conservative Members.
The matter was forced to a debate in another place by Lord Judd of Portsea, a former Labour Minister, who initiated a debate on 2 November. All those who contributed to that debate were opposed to the proposed fees. If I give their names, the House will realise the significant opposition that was expressed in the House of Lords and the duty that we have to persuade the Government to change their mind. After the opposition expressed by Lord Judd in introducing the debate, my noble Friend the Earl Russell made a strong speech of opposition, followed by the Baroness Uddin from the Labour Benches, the Lord Newton of Braintree, a former Leader of the House, who spoke in his capacity as chairman of the Council on Tribunals, Lord Weatherill, a former Speaker of the House, Lord Goldsmith, my noble Friend the Lord Dholakia, and Lord Cope of Berkeley from the Conservative Front Bench. They all spoke in the most categoric and unqualified terms about the unsuitability of the high fees that the Government propose.
Many people cannot afford these fees. Hon. Members deal with a significant number of immigration cases every week, many of which involve refusals of visa applications for people to come to this country for weddings or funerals, to visit ill relatives, to see their grandchildren and the like.
I want to refer to three cases that I have been dealing with in my constituency in the past couple of weeks to show how iniquitous the regulations could be. The first concerns a young man called Bryant Macaulay, who is a Sierra Leonean and whose family left Sierra Leone because of the troubles and fled to the Gambia. The parents have come to this country, and their application for asylum was lodged here. Bryant, the son, was left behind in the Gambia and stayed with his cousin.
The family originally took up the case with the right hon. Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), because they lived in her constituency, but have since moved to mine. They wanted the son to get permission to come particularly because Mrs. Macaulay was diagnosed as having cancer. She died of cancer in this country before the son's visa application was granted, Bryant not having been admitted.
We tried to get Bryant into the country for the funeral. The visa application was not considered before the funeral took place, and it was later rejected. The rest of the family
are in this country. I need not trouble the House with a technicality, but because the family were not rich, in his teens Bryant was adopted by a richer family, who are also in this country. He is still in the Gambia and is still waiting to come here. He has no family there and no resources to come to this country. He has only one potential route to pursue, which is to come to settle here. That was not his original intention, which was to visit his mother when she was ill, but he was turned down. He at no time had £500 to pay for an appeal against the visa refusal.The second case involves a constituent called Bola Odupitan, whose mother, Florence, lives in Nigeria. Last year, her mother was refused a visitor's visa by the British deputy high commissioner in Lagos. The reason given was that she did not, in the eyes of the entry clearance officer, have the financial support to stay in the United Kingdom, even though it was recognised that her family in the UK were willing to support her. So her mother applied again, but the only way she would have been able to finance a trip was if she had the money to come here. Now we are saying that she has to pay the £500 to appeal against the refusal, which is money that she has already been held not to have, otherwise she would have been allowed here in the first place.
The third case is that of Deborah Beyioku. She is a constituent of mine who came to see me about a year ago. Her mum applied for a visitor's visa, and it was refused in Lagos in August 1999 for lack of funds. In Nigeria, the mother earns the equivalent of only £300 a year: that is her total earnings. It is impossible for her to put £500 up front against the option of an appeal.
Ms Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Highgate): Is there not an additional iniquity? I could replicate in my own constituency the examples that the hon. Gentleman has given. I do not know whether it is the case with his constituents, but, certainly with all mine, the applicant for a visitor's visa rarely, if ever, lives close to the British high commission or British embassy that will furnish the permission, should it so be granted. The trekking backwards and forwards, on some occasions for as many as seven days, to get to our embassy, seems an additional iniquity that should be examined in some detail.
Mr. Simon Hughes: I am grateful to the hon. Lady. She makes an important point well. I have, as she and many of our colleagues will have, people who make journeys in Ethiopia, Somalia or India who have almost no money. They travel hundreds of miles to the nearest high commission or consulate. It costs to stay in the city. Often, they cannot be seen. They queue. They cannot get in on the first, or the second day. They may have to wait a third day. They have no family in the capital city.
The hon. Lady, many colleagues and I try endlessly to understand how it is that the visa is refused when the application is made. I know people who want to come to see their only grandchild whom they have never seen. They have never left their home country. They have never broken an immigration rule. They have never overstayed. There is no history of breaking the rules and they are turned down because it is said that they cannot afford to be here.
I have people who want to come for weddings. The wedding comes and goes and they never come. I have people who want to come for funerals. The funeral comes and goes and they never come. I have people who have saved up on retirement. It has been agreed that the wife will come, leaving the husband at home, or the husband will come, leaving the wife at home. The application is refused. Those cases affect real people--thousands in all our constituencies. It could be tomorrow. It could be today. I cannot understand the Government, having clearly promised to remedy a bad mistake by the Tory Government, letting people down so badly--not just any people, but many people who are among the poorest of those with whom they must deal.
There is a second and obvious point. Most of these people are not white; they are Asian or black. In my experience--I can speak only as I find, but I have talked to the Immigration Advisory Service, which has its headquarters in my constituency and which I know well, and to the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux--the majority of people whose applications for visas to come to this country are turned down are black or Asian. They are from what in this country are minority ethnic communities. Therefore, the policy is not only unjust in that it does not deal fairly with the poorest of those who look to come to this country. It is clearly discriminatory, impinging aggressively on many families in our community to whom we say that we will give equal treatment and equal worth. I thank organisations such as the Immigration Advisory Service and NACAB for their representations; many colleagues may have received them.
I do not want to take long. I want to allow colleagues to make their points, but I take the salient points in the representations, which were not answered--if I may say so with respect to the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department, and to Ministers from the Home Office--by Lord Bassam when he replied to the debate in the House of Lords: the only answer that he gave was that there would be a review. I will try to keep the temperature down. Reviews are pending on other Home Office issues--for example, to do with vouchers--which are not uncontroversial. A review in a year does not deal with the hundreds or thousands of people who will be affected by the order now. It is not satisfactory. The only satisfactory outcome will be if the House votes later to revoke the regulations; or if Ministers undertake to reduce the fee considerably much sooner than the review announced by Lord Bassam indicates.
I have no idea what Ministers have in mind, but I hope that even if they win the vote today--against what I hope will be significant opposition--they will introduce a revised and considerably reduced fee before the end of this Session.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |