Conclusions and recommendations
Undocumented passengers
1. We
assume, in the light of the Minister's comments, that a "reasonable
excuse" will include circumstances where a person fleeing
persecution has no practical way of obtaining valid documents.
We recommend that the Government make this clear explicitly in
the text of the Bill. (Paragraph 20)
2. We support in principle
the Government's new measures to penalise, in certain circumstances,
those who deliberately lose or destroy their travel documentation.
However, to avoid disadvantaging genuine refugees, we recommend
that the Government should take steps to ensure, as far as is
reasonably possible, that the potential consequences of deliberately
losing or destroying their documentation is drawn to the attention
of people arriving in the UK, both immediately on arrival at a
port, and (by requiring carriers to provide this information)
prior to arrival. (Paragraph 23)
3. We support the
use of surveillance techniques to assist in linking passengers
who lose or destroy their travel papers with their flight of arrival.
We recommend that consideration be given to extending such schemes
to airports other than Heathrow, and to seaports. We also recommend
that the tactic of deploying immigration officers to meet passengers
as they disembark from selected flights should be used more often,
both to establish where people who have disposed of their travel
documents have arrived from, and to send a discouraging message
to the criminal 'facilitators' (Paragraph 26)
4. We recommend that
the Government should clarify its intentions as to whether or
not, if it were to introduce a power to require carriers to copy
travel documents, this would apply to all carriers and all flights.
(Paragraph 29)
5. We recognise that
a power [to require carriers to copy travel documents] such as
the Government envisages may be useful if used in the targeted
manner described by the Minister. We believe that the Government
should demonstrate that the proposal would not cause undue delays
to legitimate passengers and that the costs imposed on airlines
would be commensurate with the benefits to be gained in tackling
abuse of the asylum system. We hope that the Government will not
seek to amend the Bill to introduce this provision without first
publishing the results of its consultations with carriers and
other interested parties. We believe that it would be desirable
for the Government to publish an assessment of the operation of
similar powers in the Netherlands. (Paragraph 33)
Reform of the appeals process
6. We
recommend that, in considering the Government's proposed simplification
of the asylum appeals system, the House should consider whether
the Government has made sufficient commitment to investing the
necessary resources, and making other improvements to the quality
of initial decision-making on asylum cases. The real flaws in
the system appear to be at the stage of initial decision-making,
not that of appeal. We recommend that the implementation of the
new asylum appeals system should be contingent on a significant
improvement in initial decision making having been demonstrated.
In particular, the relevant sections of the Act should not be
brought into force until the statistics show a clear reduction
in the number of successful appeals at the first-tier, adjudication
level. (Paragraph 43)
Removal to a 'safe third country'
7. We
repeat our earlier recommendation, in respect of non-suspensive
appeals, and make a similar recommendation in respect of the proposals
relating to 'safe third countries' in the present Bill, i.e. that
if the Secretary of State wishes to add further countries to the
list in Schedule 3 to the Bill, he should append a written memorandum
to the relevant Statutory Instrument, explaining the rationale
for believing those countries to be safe. (Paragraph 53)
8. We also recommend
that the Government should make a clear statement of the circumstances
which might trigger a decision to seek parliamentary authority
for the removal of a country from the list of 'safe third countries'.
In particular, we expect that satisfactory mechanisms will be
set up within Government to keep the human rights situation in
'safe third countries' under review, so that they do not remain
on the list if that situation significantly deteriorates and they
cease to be safe. (Paragraph 54)
Restricting family support
9. The
Minister also informed us that the Home Office is not in a position
to give estimates of the number of families to whom Clause 7 might
apply. We believe that this is unsatisfactory and that the Home
Office should at least be able to publish figures showing the
number of families, including the number of children, who are
currently in the asylum system and to whom Clause 7 could apply.
(Paragraph 64)
10. We believe that
the priority should be to improve the removal system so that it
is understood by all parties that a failed claim will lead to
swift action to effect a removal. (Paragraph 67)
11. The principle
behind Clause 7, of removing taxpayers' support from those with
no right to asylum, is justified, and we do not recommend that
Clause 7 be removed from the Bill. However, we recommend that
the Government should give assurances that Clause 7 will not come
into effect until the House is satisfied that in practice it will
not lead to significant numbers of children being taken into care.
(Paragraph 69)
12. We recommend that
in its consideration of the Bill, the House should give particular
attention to the way in which the Government plans to implement
Clause 7. (Paragraph 69)
13. If the provisions
in Clause 7 are brought into effect, we recommend that the Government
should submit a written report to Parliament once a year on the
number of families from whom benefit has been removed under the
terms of the clause, and the number of children who have been
taken into care as a result of the operation of the clause. (Paragraph
70)
14. We believe that
it would be an important safeguard if the Government were to publish
and regularly update a list of those countries for which a voluntary
resettlement programme is in place. (Paragraph 71)
New powers for the Immigration Services Commissioner
15. We
consider that the proposed new powers for the Immigration Services
Commissioner, which have been requested by the Commissioner himself,
are sensible and proportionate, and we urge the House to support
them. (Paragraph 77)
Other measures in the Bill
16. [Clause
4 and Clause 15] were not announced in advance of the
publication of the Bill on 27 November, and accordingly we have
not had an opportunity to take evidence on them or explore their
implications with the Minister. We therefore recommend that the
Standing Committee on the Bill should give particular attention
to these provisions, with a view to exploring and testing the
Government's justification for them. (Paragraph 79)
| 
