The
Chairman: I now call Mr. Damian Green, perhaps
to fix
it.
Damian
Green: I will address that point directly. It is indeed
true that I believe, as all sensible people do, that “If it
ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, but the fact is
it’s broke—our borders system is not working. It needs to
be fixed, which is the purpose of our proposal. Until that point I was
about to stand up and say that I was delighted that we were having such
a serious debate.
This is a
serious proposal, and as the Minister made clear—very
honestly—many people who have looked at the matter feel that we
need to move down a track towards better and greater integration of all
the enforcement bodies that work at our borders and deal with
immigration crime both at the borders and beyond. In some ways, the
last part of his speech exaggerated the difference between us. All the
rest of his speech had made it clear that we all believe that there
should be greater integration. There are practical points about which
parts are done when and how fast, which is what everyone dealing with
these things seriously needs to address, but I do not think anyone
doubts the final destination. As I listened to the Minister’s
speech, it struck me that whatever happens politically, I would be
surprised if something like our proposal were not in place in five
years’ time; it certainly will be if there is a Conservative
Government after the next election. The thrust of the argument is that
we are heading in that
direction.
1.45
pm Let
me deal with some of the points that were raised, many of which are
very good. The hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington said that
while the amendment was particularly focused on immigration, other
things at the border are important. I completely agree with
that. I said in my initial remarks that it was not just about stopping
illegal immigration, although that is clearly hugely important and is
one of the parts of the system that is broken at the moment; it is
about human trafficking, drugs, guns and other crimes that are
increasingly international. I entirely take his point on
that. The
hon. Member for Midlothian made a powerful, passionate speech about the
inadequacies of the current arrangement. He made the point that in the
form of the transport police we already have a national specialist
police force. It may be of interest to him to know that one of the
people sitting on the Stevens committee was the newly knighted Sir Ian
Johnston, who brought to the committee his experience as the long-time
chief constable of the transport police. He was included on the
committee precisely because he has run a relatively small, specialist,
national force. He believes, as a member of the committee who signed
that report, that that is the best way we could operate a border police
force. Others have spotted that very important read-across. Since then,
this Government have introduced SOCA. I know that it is not a police
force but an agency, but it is another attempt, if you like, to
nationalise as opposed to regionalise a part of specialist policing
operations. The tide of history is flowing in that
direction. I
do not wish to enter the debate about what should happen to regional
police forces, as neither the shadow Home Secretary nor the shadow
Minister for Police Reform would thank me for treading outside my
territory. There appears to be a widespread consensus that, in terms of
these specialist parts of policing, national activities are preferable.
I am glad that the Minister has said that he will not rule it out and
that he found the arguments compelling. He had a number of objections
and his point about how we get co-operation in practice is a real one.
Inevitably, if we are to discourage illegal employers or human
traffickers, we will have to do it all over the country; we would have
to know that we can operate anywhere. Therefore, in practical terms, we
may well have to rely at times on local forces to do that.
The
Minister’s argument was that it is working wonderfully well now.
[Interruption.] That is unfair; that was a slight
parody of what he said. He said that it is working better now—it
may be, but it started from a low base. As he knows, it does not work
brilliantly now and there are many areas of the country where
individual local police have been quoted as saying that they would like
to do more in areas such as human trafficking but they have no drivers
to do so. They are not funded to do so and they do not score any points
on their Home Office public service agreements by doing so. It is
almost as if they are discouraged from doing things in an area that
would be of central interest to a border police force.
The Minister
says that it will be easier to get local police forces to co-operate
with UKBA than it would be with a border police force. I disagree with
him about that. It seems overwhelmingly likely that if two parts of the
police family talk to each other and, if necessary—if they are
making large strategic decisions—chief constable talks to chief
constable, there would be more co-operation than there is now. We have
never tried that, so neither of us can be definitive about it, but that
may lead to a better system.
The
Minister’s second argument was that we have so much more
intelligence now that we will reach the stage where we know where the
vast majority of overstayers are; that would generate a requirement for
more enforcement activity. If that is the worst problem that we have to
face in three or four years’ time, we have made a tremendous
step forward. By that I mean actually knowing where thousands of
illegal immigrants are. I am not sure whether I share the
Minister’s optimism about the beneficial effects of technology.
I hope that he is right, and if he is right, we have to organise the
enforcement activity, which brings us back to the previous argument
about how best to get the national border force and the regional police
forces working together. As I say, we differ on that
matter. The
Minister makes the point that organisations such as the Kent police and
the Association of Police Authorities do not like the idea. I have
spoken at length to the Kent police about the matter. I am an MP for
Kent and I know the force well. It does its job effectively and has
developed expertise in this matter. From a national perspective, it is
important that we do not lose that expertise, and if possible we should
spread the practice to other forces as well. Again, it seems that there
is a prima facie case for arguing that if the people who are doing a
good job in Kent are part of a force that is working all around the
border, then we will improve performance in other areas.
The Minister
makes the point about cost, which is obviously a serious point. How we
deploy the money spent on the police in the most effective way at a
time when economic failure has made the public finances a train wreck
is obviously a problem that faces existing Ministers and will face
future ones as
well.
Tom
Brake: We costed at around £100 million our
proposals for a UK border force. Does the hon. Gentleman have a figure
for what he believes his proposals would
cost?
Damian
Green: I do not, and not because I am just not giving a
figure but because it depends on what we do, when we do it, the speed
of integration and what duplications there may be within the existing
structure. The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. I do not have an
exact figure to give him now, but one will come. The detailed argument
that we are having about when we integrate and at what stage we do it
has a significant impact on the
costs. The
Minister’s final point was about some of the beneficial things
that have happened, all of which boil down to embedding immigration
expertise inside the police. The various specific local and regional
examples that he gave were about why policing has become more
effective, and it is precisely because there are now people who are
full-time experts on immigration crime inside the police. I agree with
that; it is a very important step forward and precisely why we are
trying to make it permanent with a border police force. As we all agree
that immigration-related crime and cross-border crime is big and will
be an increasing problem, it seems to me that making that kind of
beneficial sharing of expertise permanent and nationwide is precisely
why we argued for a border police force and why we have tabled the new
clause, which I commend to the
Committee. Question
put, That the clause be read a Second
time. The
Committee divided: Ayes 4, Noes
7.
Division No.
9] Question
accordingly
negatived.
New Clause
5Amendment
of the immigration rules relating to
Gurkhas ‘(1) The Immigration
Rules, as laid before Parliament under section (3)(2) of the
Immigration Act 1971 (c.77), are amended as
follows— “(2) In
Rule 276F (requirements for indefinite leave to enter the United
Kingdom as a Gurkha discharged from the British Army) omit paragraphs
(ii) and (iii). (3) In Rule
276I (requirements for indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom
as a Gurkha discharged from the British Army) omit paragraphs (ii) and
(iii).—(Tom
Brake.) Brought
up, and read the First
time. Tom
Brake: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second
time. It
is fair to say that, over the past couple of months, the issue of the
Gurkhas has received a significant and appropriate airing, both in this
place and elsewhere. It is therefore not my intention—and I am
sure that you would not allow it, Sir Nicholas—to go back over
what has happened in recent years. Members are very familiar with the
issue and will know that, in 2004, the Government changed the rules to
allow Gurkhas who had served for four years or more to remain in the
UK. However, those changes applied only to Gurkhas discharged from the
British Army on or after 1 July 1997.
I think that
all Members would agree that the treatment of the Gurkhas has not been
the finest hour of this or—possibly—past Governments.
However, it has afforded us a most memorable piece of cult viewing
that, I am sure, is still circulating widely on YouTube. I suspect
that, to this day, the Minister wakes up in a cold sweat every night
worried about whether Joanna Lumley is going to doorstep him that
morning. I even considered threatening him with Joanna Lumley over the
Chagos island issue earlier in the debate. I hope he has recovered from
his experience, although those who watched the ambush observed how
effective it was. All future Ministers need to study what happened,
perhaps to avoid similar things happening to them.
I shall not
continue along that line of argument, because I am sure that you would
cut me short, Sir Nicholas. However, Members might be interested to
know that today the 2nd Battalion of Gurkhas were given the freedom of
the town of Folkestone; so nationally there is recognition of the very
important role that they have played—some 200,000 soldiers, two
world wars and so on. We know that the Government have finally
responded to the issue, and I understand that the latest Government
position is that guidance will be issued to ensure that the Gurkhas are
treated fairly.
One of my
members of staff has had discussions with the Home Office on that
point, however, and I have just come from an event at which a senior
civil servant pointed out that guidance can very easily be disregarded.
It can very easily be substituted with later guidance. So new clause 5
would enshrine in law what I believe Members of all parties want the
Government to do. It would not afford any wriggle room. It would take
the action that many Members believe needs to be taken and allow us to
take it without further delay. I hope that the Minister will consider
it to be a very straightforward and helpful way of ensuring that this
issue, which has proved painful for him in particular, is finally put
to bed and
resolved. 2
pm
Damian
Green: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing us
a quick run round the Gurkha course again. Enough has been said on the
subject of Joanna Lumley and on ambushes, but I must say that one of
the Minister’s unique places in history, for which he will be
immortalised, is as the only middle-aged man in history who looked that
uncomfortable that close to Joanna Lumley. [Laughter.] As has
been said, it cannot have been his most enjoyable
week. The
serious question that I put to the Minister is, what is now happening?
It would be useful to know. We had the Sturm und Drang of the
parliamentary defeat and the Government U-turn, but there has been a
deafening silence ever since, so this is the ideal time for him to at
least give the Committee a timetable for putting into effect what the
then Home Secretary told the House and explain what the new system will
be and how it will work. I appreciate that there are many details to
work out, but the Government have had several weeks in which to do
that.
It goes
without saying that we all admire and respect what the Gurkhas have
been doing and still do for this country. We believe that they have
done great service that deserves not only our respect, but the reward
of being allowed to settle in this country. It would be better, not
least for the Minister’s comfort, if there was no sense that the
eventual solution was being delayed, because otherwise he will have the
Gurkha campaigners on his back again. My friendly advice is that I do
not think that that would be a happy or healthy position for him to be
in.
Mr.
Woolas: To the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington
for tabling the new clause, I say: thanks. I do not know about
middle-aged men being uncomfortable, but sometimes in ministerial life
it is the worst of two evils to put oneself in that situation, but that
is one for the
memoirs. My
understanding is that the new clause, tabled by the hon. Members for
Carshalton and Wallington and for Rochdale, is intended to remove two
requirements from the rules relating to indefinite leave to enter or
indefinite leave to remain for former Gurkhas. Those two requirements
are: the requirement to be discharged from the British Army in Nepal on
completion of engagement on or after 1 July 1997, and the requirement
to have been discharged from the British Army not more than two years
prior to the date on which the application is made. That would mean
that Gurkhas discharged prior to July 1997 could qualify for indefinite
leave to enter or remain under the immigration rules.
In response to
the new clause’s first provision, I can say that the revised
policy announced by the Home Secretary on 21 May 2009 had the same
effect in that regard as the new clause, so that provision is already
there. The new clause’s second provision would have the effect
of removing the time limit for applications for indefinite leave for
all former Gurkhas, not just those discharged prior to 1 July 1997. I
will explain why we wish, on that specific point, to resist the new
clause. The policy announced on 21 May, following consideration, meets
the concerns of Parliament on the issue. That led subsequently to new
draft guidelines, based on the seminar of the Home Affairs Committee,
to which we were very grateful.
The Select
Committee fulfilled its role superbly in helping Parliament and
advising Government. I was glad that we were able to use that conduit,
given that Parliament was suffering severe public criticism. Although I
disagreed with the decision of the House, I said that evening that I
respected its decision, and I put my shoulder to the wheel to deliver
what Parliament had insisted upon. The Select Committee was beneficial
in helping with that. The subsequent process was to publish new draft
guidelines to meet the requests of the pre-1997 Gurkhas; they were
shared with the Select Committee and the Gurkhas’
representatives, including Miss Lumley. Agreement and an understanding
were reached.
The criteria
for the pre-1997 people were therefore that soldiers must have served
for at least four years, but there is no time limit on their
application—a critical difference from what people expected.
There is not a two-year window, and there are a number of reasons for
that. One was a recognition of the practicalities—of how we
could inform people in Nepal of their rights. Another was that we did
not want to create a rush that we could not handle administratively,
which would cause difficulties with housing and so on. For the pre-1997
people there is no cut-off
point. The
difficulty with the second implication of new clause 5 for post-1997
Gurkhas is the critical principle called for by their
representatives—indeed, hon. Members on both sides of the House
argued for it—that they should have parity with other
Commonwealth servicemen and women in our armed forces. That would
require a two-year cut-off point, after four years of service. In other
words, it would give the post-1997 Gurkhas something better than was
given to the Commonwealth soldiers. That is not what is being pushed
for by the representatives, and no Government would be able to adhere
to it because, in effect, it would open up a retrospective right for
Commonwealth soldiers. That would be unmanageable, and not
required.
I hope that I
have answered the hon. Member for Ashford. The new guidance is out, and
a statement has been made to the House. I will be bringing my life-size
cut-out of Miss Lumley to future meetings, as my recognition rating in
my constituency is significantly higher than it was before that
episode. I have never been the victim—if victim is the right
word—of such jealousy. More seriously, I hope that I have met
the point being made by the hon. Member for Carshalton and
Wallington.
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