Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-09
Topic: Immigration
Margot Aline (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I support Amendment 57. I will not repeat all the arguments I made in Committee in support of this most basic of civil rights—the right to be able to undertake paid work. I simply want to respond to a couple of the arguments that the noble Lord, Lord Ashton of Hyde, made in response in Committee As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, noted in so ably moving the amendment, the main argument seemed to be our old friend, the pull factor, which dominates policy-making in this area. Since that debate, my attention has been drawn to the only piece of research I am aware of that has explored with individual asylum seekers and refugees the factors that informed their decision to seek asylum in the UK. The report Chance or Choice? by Heaven Crawley was published a few years ago by the Refugee Council. I will quote from it in the interests of evidence-based policy-making. Her broad finding was that, contrary to the assumptions on which policy is premised, "the choices asylum seekers make are rarely the outcome of a rational decision making process in which individuals have full knowledge of all the alternatives and weigh them in some conscious process designed to maximise returns" Professor Crawley found no evidence from this or other research that work acts as a pull factor. Instead, she concludes that, "the policy change introduced nearly a decade ago to prevent asylum seekers from working whilst their claim is determined has had no measurable impact on the level of applications received" The report said of asylum seekers, "the inability to work was the biggest difficulty they faced in rebuilding their lives. Lack of access to work has psychological and social as well as economic consequences" It quoted a woman from Zimbabwe who said: "Sometimes I just cry. It’s like I am worthless, like I am just this piece of junk" Another said: "My mind has gone rusty. I am not able to look at a meaningful life anymore. I look at it and I think, oh what a wasted life" It is terrible that people are having to feel this The noble Lord, Lord Alton, cited a range of cross-national evidence that does not support the argument that enabling people to work acts as a pull factor. No doubt the Minister will respond with the other argument given twice in Committee: "It is important that we protect the resident labour market for those lawfully present in the UK".—[Official Report, 20/1/16; col. 850.] But asylum seekers are lawfully present until they are deemed otherwise. To suggest they are not plays into the popular tendency to conflate asylum seekers with undocumented economic migrants This leads to my final point. A number of noble Lords and organisations outside have expressed the fear that by denying asylum seekers access to legitimate paid work, sheer need and desperation will push them into the shadow economy where they are prey to exploitation. I raised earlier my concerns that they could now also be caught by Clause 32, which will criminalise them. To conclude, like the noble Lord, Lord Alton, I do not believe that the Government have made their case that current policy is, to quote the noble Lord, Lord Ashton of Hyde, "fair and proportionate". On the contrary, it is unfair and disproportionate when compared with the position in most other EU countries, and in its short-term and long-term impact on asylum seekers and refugees whose subsequent integration into British society is impeded by it, as we have already heard. As Ian Birrell, former speech writer for the Prime Minister, wrote earlier this week: "The key is to let refugees work legitimately, so they can build a fresh start—wherever they are. After all, what human being wants life trapped in limbo … Refugees may have escaped hell, but that does not mean we force them into purgatory" It feels as if, too often, we do just that. This amendment would help asylum seekers out of the purgatory of enforced idleness and impoverishment.