The
Committee consisted of the following
Members:
Chairman:
Mr.
Nigel Evans
Crausby,
Mr. David
(Bolton, North-East)
(Lab)
Engel,
Natascha
(North-East Derbyshire)
(Lab)
Green,
Damian
(Ashford)
(Con)
Grogan,
Mr. John
(Selby)
(Lab)
Harris,
Dr. Evan
(Oxford, West and Abingdon)
(LD)
Harris,
Mr. Tom
(Glasgow, South)
(Lab)
Huhne,
Chris
(Eastleigh)
(LD)
Jenkin,
Mr. Bernard
(North Essex)
(Con)
Linton,
Martin
(Battersea)
(Lab)
McCabe,
Steve
(Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's
Treasury)
McCafferty,
Chris
(Calder Valley)
(Lab)
Main,
Anne
(St. Albans)
(Con)
Morgan,
Julie
(Cardiff, North)
(Lab)
Newmark,
Mr. Brooks
(Braintree)
(Con)
Swire,
Mr. Hugo
(East Devon)
(Con)
Woolas,
Mr. Phil
(Minister for Borders and
Immigration)Gosia McBride,
Committee Clerk
attended
the Committee
Seventh
Delegated Legislation
Committee
Wednesday
24 February
2010
[Mr.
Nigel Evans in the
Chair]
Draft
Immigration and Nationality (Fees) Regulations
2010
2.30
pm
The
Minister for Borders and Immigration (Mr. Phil
Woolas): I beg to move,
That the
Committee has considered the draft Immigration and Nationality (Fees)
Regulations 2010.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to consider the
draft Immigration (Leave to Enter and Remain) (Amendment) Order
2010.
Mr.
Woolas: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship
again, Mr. Evans, especially as a fellow Lancastrian MP. I
will speak on the draft order before moving on to the draft
regulations.
The draft
order will facilitate the entry of automated gate users into the United
Kingdom by amending the Immigration (Leave to Enter and Remain) Order
2000. Automated gates, which are already in use at some UK airports,
speed up the passage through the border of legitimate travellers by
allowing permitted passengers lawfully to enter the UK without having
to queue up at the manual immigration
control.
The
gates work by verifying a persons identity and making checks
against our Home Office systems to ensure that they are eligible to use
the gate and enter the country. If the person is eligible, the gates
open and allow the person to come in. If not, the gates remain closed
and the person is required to seek entry at the manual immigration
control. I emphasise that use of the gates is entirely voluntary. They
have two main benefits: they allow eligible users to enter the UK
quickly and efficiently and reduce the number of low-risk passengers
queuing up at the manual immigration control, allowing our UK Border
Agency officials to focus staff resources on the higher-risk passengers
at the primary
checkpoint.
There
are currently two automated gate schemes in operation. The first is
called the e-passport gate and can be used only by European economic
area nationals who hold a second generation biometric passport. The
gates, which do not require any pre-enrolment by users, are being
trialled in 10 UK airport terminals. To date, more than 1 million of
the crossings of the UK border have been made using that
method.
The second
scheme is IRISthe iris recognition immigration
systemand is available to all traveller categories. A person
wishing to use IRIS must go through an enrolment process that includes
a face-to-face interview with a UKBA officer. If the person is
considered suitable, their biometrics are taken and securely stored.
IRIS is also installed in 10 UK airport terminals. More than 350,000
passengers have enrolled on to the IRIS scheme
since January 2006, and collectively they have used IRIS gates 2.7
million timesthey are the frequent travellers. Hon. Members may
be familiar with the gates if they have signed up to IRIS; I certainly
find them
convenient.
Future
automated gate schemes are being developed with the British Airports
Authority. We will roll out a new pre-enrolment automated gate scheme,
the automated clearance system plus, at Heathrow airport; it is due to
go live this year. Like IRIS, nationals of all countries can apply to
enrol on to ACS plus. Again, as with IRIS, UKBA officers will interview
every applicant to assess a persons suitability. If someone is
approved, their fingerprints and an image of their face will be taken
and securely stored before they are able to use the schemes
gates. I ought to explain that the image of the face,
which to the layperson might be a photograph, is, in fact, a geometric
map of a persons face which enables us to secure
identity.
The
order is necessary because the current method of granting leave to
enter to non-visa nationals who use automatic gates is inefficient and
out of date. Non-visa national Irish users are currently granted leave
via a paper notice printed by the gates. When the gates
printers break down, which they do on occasion, or run out of paper,
the whole gate system is shut down and cannot be used by any
passengers. Users also regularly forget to take their written notice
from the gate, which then retracts the printout for security reasons,
again taking the gates out of
operation.
The
order provides a better and more efficient method of granting leave to
non-visa national gate users. The order allows the UKBA officers to
authorise a person as someone who may obtain leave by using the
automated gates following satisfactory screening. Thereafter, each time
the person uses the gates to enter the UK, he or she will automatically
be granted leave to enter for six months, on the same basis as leave
granted at the manual immigration control to non-visa nationals who
seek to enter as a visitor. In both cases, recourse to public funds and
employment is prohibited. The only difference is that gate users will
not receive written evidence of their leave when they use the
gate.
In
practice, the order needs to apply only to non-visa nationals, as other
types of traveller do not require leave to be granted when they seek
entry to the UK. British citizens and EEA nationals do not require
leave to enter the UK, visa nationals are granted leave in the form of
a visa before they arrive in the UK, and foreign nationals who are
settled in the UK already have limited or indefinite leave to remain in
the country. I trust that hon. Members will join me in supporting such
pragmatic, sensible
measures.
The
draft regulations deal with fees. The UK Border Agency is equipped to
protect our border in the 21st centuryit says here. We have
25,000 staffin fact, it is 23,000including more than
9,000 warranted customs and immigration officers. They work in local
communities, at the border and in 135 countries around the world.
Maintaining our immigration system costs more than £2 billion
per year. This year we have made significant progress and extended the
number of visitors who require a visathat is, the countries
with the visa-waiver test that we have put in placeso more
countries require visas for their nationals.
We have
already enrolled more than 5 million sets of fingerprints and thereby
detected thousands of false identities. So far, we have issued more
than 130,000 identity cards to foreign nationalswe exceeded our
target by 15,000 a month ahead of scheduleand we continue to
work with the French Government to build on our joint operations to
reduce further the number of illegal immigrants attempting to cross the
border to the United Kingdom. To fund that, we consider that those who
benefit directly from our immigration system should contribute towards
the costs of running it, so that we can balance that with the interests
of the general UK taxpayer, who will continue to support the
immigration system. This years fee review takes place against a
difficult financial context for the UK Border
Agency.
The
draft regulations are made under section 51 of the Immigration, Asylum
and Nationality Act 2006 and in accordance with the powers granted in
section 42 of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.)
Act 2004, as amended by section 20 of the UK Borders Act 2007. Under
section 42, the Secretary of State can set a fee for an application at
a level that exceeds the administrative cost of determining the
application. By charging above the administrative cost, the UK Border
Agency is able to generate sufficient revenue to secure the border and
control migration for the benefit of our
country.
The
way our legal powers are defined means that we must also specify fees
in separate regulations under the powers in section 51 of the 2006 Act.
The regulations are to set the fees for applications, processes and
services that are provided at or below the administrative cost of
determining the application. The regulations were laid in Parliament on
10 February; they are subject to the negative procedure and not
debated. I recognise that having two sets of regulations makes the
legislative process complicated. We are trying to improve this as part
of our work on the draft immigration simplification Bill that is before
the
House.
This
year, for the majority of our application routes we propose a maximum
inflationary increase in fees of 2.5 per cent. We have succeeded in
limiting the extent of our general increases by taking a more targeted
approach to fees adjustment, which is consistent with our strategic
principles. We have also introduced some new chargeable services. The
targeted increases include settlement visas, which better reflects the
value of the product we offer and aligns the fee with the amounts paid
by migrants coming to the UK under economic routes. We have increased
the fee for long-term visit visas to reflect the value that such
products represent to applicants.
There is a
£50 increase to the fee for the tier 1 post-study route, which
better aligns that fee with that paid by other applicants under tier 1.
I informed the House previously of our intention to do that. There is
an above inflationary increase for all applications made at a public
inquiry office to reflect better the benefits associated with the
applications.
New
fees include a fee for all UK-based dependant applications and a new
pilot service for premium biometric enrolment and case-working. That is
offered in response to customer demand from individuals who are
cash-rich but time-poorchairmen of city firms or premiership
footballers. Essentially, I propose that we charge them £15,000
for a premium service so that we can provideam I allowed to say
the redistribution of wealth? Strike that
from the record. New fees also include a new dependent relative
settlement fee covering parents, grandparents and certain other
relatives joining family members who are already settled in the UK. The
new fee reflects the benefits to applicants, including the right to
stay in the UK.
The overall
aim is to ensure our fees make an appropriate contribution to the
end-to-end costs of the immigration system. I believe the fees are in
the best interests of the United Kingdom, maintaining what I believe to
be one of the worldsI should say the democratic
worldsmost secure borders and bringing with it a basic
core of cost, especially as we seek to improve the speed and quality of
decision making on our visa functions. I therefore commend instruments
to the Committee.
The
Chairman: Let me make a procedural announcement. As the
Committee knows, both statutory instruments, being taken together, can
be debated now. At the end of the debate, however, I will put the
Question on each separately, so please stay for both
Questions.
2.42
pm
Damian
Green (Ashford) (Con): It is always life-enhancing to
serve under you, Mr. Evans. The Minister prayed in aid your
fellow representation of Lancastrian constituencies, so I feel I should
retaliate by praying in aid our fellow Welshness. It is a particular
pleasure to serve under
you.
I
was struck by two elements of faith in the Ministers opening
remarks. He announced that we have one of the safest and most secure
borders in the world, which struck me as optimistic. In relation to the
gates he has introduced, he said that he proposes to extend the use of
faith in technology and systems. I applaud his optimism. I hope that he
is right in both cases, particularly in respect of the gates, because
this country will become increasingly dependent on technology as we
remove the human element for the convenience of travellers. He, like
me, will be conscious of the expertise and the experience that has been
built up by the UKBA and those who stand at borders and make judgments
about people in queues. We are taking that out of the system, so let us
hope that the technology works. As I said, I am not expressing a
principled view against
it.
I
am grateful for the Ministers explanation of the roll-out, but
I have some questions, the first of which relates to the e-passport
gate for EEA nationals with the second-generation biometric passport.
It would be helpful if he explained the balance of the cost in
installing the gates between the UKBA and the airport operator, which I
assume is the other side of the equation. How much is the taxpayer
paying for the new
system?
The
Minister is confident about the absolute safety and security of the
biometric passports issued by all the other EEA countries. Are the
Government sure that everyone else in the EEA matches the standards
that we would like to see, as we are granting travellers from those
countries a huge privilege, in that they will not be interrogated by a
human as they enter this country? The Christmas day bomber boarded his
last plane at Schiphol, so extremely dangerous people can clearly board
planes with murderous intent within the EEA. I appreciate that that did
not relate to passports, but it did relate to airports within the EEA.
It is an important and practical
issue, and the public will want to be reassured that the other countries
that enjoy such a privilege have appropriate standards of
security.
Another
issue that I hope the Minister will deal with is database
securitysecurity of individuals data and the ability to
withstand hacking by criminal or terrorist elements. I want to know, in
particular, whether there is a single database in this country or
whether we are sharing information with all the countries of the EEA.
If it is the latter, are we confident about the security of the
databases?
My
second set of questions relates to the IRIS pre-enrolment gates. What
is the balance of their cost between the UKBA and the airport operator?
Will the Minister deal with reliability? He spoke to some extent of the
reliability of the new system, but he will be aware that apparently the
existing machines have broken down more often than they have worked. I
have had many conversations with travellers who have enrolled for the
system and who think that it is great in theory but that it never
works. They say that the system is always closed when they turn up at
airports.