Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Lords, 2021-04-21
Topic: Immigration
Molly Christine Meacher (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I rise to move Amendments 40B and 40C, which need to be taken together. Again, I thank supporters across the House, including the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London, for their support and I thank the Minister for our very helpful meeting yesterday. I was very grateful for a very open discussion about the issues The purpose of our original Amendment 40 was to protect victims of domestic abuse whose migration status is uncertain. About half of these victims are too afraid to report the crimes committed against them. Their perpetrators threaten that the victim will be detained or deported if they report the abuse. Irrespective of what their immigration status is, it is a very useful threat for perpetrators to use. The victims have good reason to be afraid because, at present, if the victim reports a crime of domestic abuse to the police, there is every reason the police may pass that information along to the immigration authorities. This is at a moment of crisis for the victim, when they have quite likely been made homeless, they may have been thrown out of their home and are completely vulnerable. The idea that the immigration authorities begin to look for them at that point is utterly inappropriate To make clear what we were trying to achieve: our amendment was intended to prevent information about the victim, or any witnesses, being passed from the police to the immigration services. I understand the reasons for the Commons’ rejection of the amendment. They argue that the Government have committed to the review that the Minister has referred to about the processing of migrant victims’ personal data for the purposes of immigration control and that the amendment would pre-empt the outcome of that review. I totally understand that Incidentally, the Minister referred to the need for information to be passed to the NHS. We agree with that and we are not talking about blocking the sharing of information with the NHS; we are simply talking about the police passing information to the immigration services, which is a completely different issue Our compromise amendment fully respects the Government’s position and takes account of it. The only reason given by the Commons for rejecting the amendment was the fact that the review is ongoing. Amendment 40C, linked with Amendment 40B, makes clear that regulations under this section will not come into force "until both Houses of Parliament have approved a resolution to the effect … after … any publication of the outcome of a review … or after 1 July 2021, whichever is the sooner." As the Minister has explained, it is expected that the review will be published in June. Therefore, the review will need to be completed, and it will need resolutions from both Houses before these protections could be introduced. So we are allowing time for the review to be completed and also putting quite an onerous block in the way of this reform by saying "we need a resolution from both Houses." The Minister referred to the National Police Chiefs’ Council guidance, but I am told that the guidance is implemented very unevenly across the country. If we simply enhance the guidance, that is no guarantee that these victims of domestic abuse will be protected. It simply is not sufficient or strong enough The Minister explained to me that, if protection of domestic abuse victims is needed, there may be a Bill in the next Session. However, these things are very uncertain, and all we are doing is leaving open the option of resolutions of both Houses. If there is an alternative Bill, then clearly this matter could be picked up in that Bill. The Government rightly said that the original amendment was not acceptable because it pre-empted the review, so we have taken that on board fully One of the issues is that the review will need to illustrate that there is a problem with these victims of domestic abuse having such fear that they do not report the crimes committed against them. I worry that the review sounds as though it will be focusing on the positive experiences of some domestic abuse victims whose immigration status is settled or quite straight- forward In our meeting the Minister referred, as he did today, to the 128 domestic abuse victims who are in touch with immigration officials. About 60% of them have settled status and the remaining 30%-plus have not been detained or deported. This is welcome information, but we have no idea whether those 128 represent 1% or 10% of these migrant women who are victims of domestic abuse. It would be extremely helpful if the review tried to identify this cohort of about half of domestic abuse victims who have an immigration status issue to find out exactly what is happening to them. I ask the Minister to make sure that the review adequately covers that half of the cohort about which we are talking.