Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-22
Topic: Immigration
Richard Rosser (Labour, Centre-left): The purpose of this Bill is narrow in scope. It is to end EU freedom of movement rules in the United Kingdom and it has just nine clauses. EEA nationals will become subject to United Kingdom immigration laws after the Brexit transition period, and thus be covered by the Government’s points-based immigration system, to be introduced next year. This Bill is nearly identical to its predecessor, which fell due to the general election last year. It took just six weeks to complete all its stages in the Commons before being passed unamended at Third Reading on 30 June. Progress in the Lords will not be so rapid as in the Commons, although it remains to be seen whether that will be due solely to the August Recess The Bill does not itself create a new immigration system. The change to the points-based system will be covered in unamendable Immigration Rules. However, the Bill gives Henry VIII powers to the Government which are so wide-ranging in the way they are worded that they would enable the Government to modify, by unamendable statutory instrument, both primary immigration legislation and retained direct EU legislation. The Government maintain that the Henry VIII powers in Clause 4 are only to address necessary technical legislative changes to primary legislation, arising from the ending of free movement The same powers in Clause 5, say the Government, are there to enable, first, consequential modifications to be made to primary legislation and other retained EU law if areas of the retained EU social security co-ordination regulations, co-ordinating access to social security for individuals moving between EEA states, have to be repealed because they are not covered in a reciprocal agreement with the EU following the end of the transition period; and, secondly, if consequential technical amendments are needed to legislation arising from any new reciprocal agreement with the EU The Lords Delegated Powers Committee said of the previous Bill, however, that Clause 4 presents "a very significant delegation of power from Parliament to the Executive", and on Clause 5 it said that "Parliament is being asked to scrutinise a clause so lacking in any substance whatsoever that it cannot even be described as a skeleton." Parliament is going to be denied any proper say and involvement in determining even the basic principles of our future immigration policy post Brexit, and the ending of free movement. Yet the Government admit in their fact sheet 3 on the Bill that: "By ending free movement, the Bill makes a substantial change to the UK’s immigration laws." This is not about the merits or otherwise of Brexit; that decision has been made. It is about the Government’s attitude towards Parliament and its major law-making process in scrutinising and then deciding which Government legislative proposals should, or should not, be passed, rejected or amended While the Bill seeks to deny an opportunity to address issues of concern about our immigration system, that does not mean they were not raised in the Commons and will not be raised in the Lords. Issues that have had cross-party support include a time limit on immigration detention for the purpose of deportation, the granting of automatic indefinite leave to remain to eligible EEA and Swiss national children who are in care, or are care leavers, and the need for the continuation of the existing EU arrangements on unaccompanied child refugees and family reunification Further issues include, but are not confined to: the application of the "no recourse to public funds" rules, in the light of an apparent promise of a review made by the Prime Minister on 27 May; the progress being made on the Government’s commitment to abolish the immigration health charge for all migrants working in the NHS and social care; exemption from the immigration skills charge for NHS employers in the light of the reality that some hospitals are now paying nearly £1 million a year; clarity on the rights and status of EU nationals in the UK following the end of the transition period, including proof of settled status; and limitations on the duration of the Henry VIII powers The end of free movement and the move to the points-based immigration system, with its general salary threshold of £25,600 per annum for coming to work in the UK, seeks to equate low pay with low skills and low value. Consequently, this sends a very clear negative message to low-paid, but not low-skilled, EU nationals currently working in the UK. Many of these people have been among those who have kept, and are keeping, our public services going during the pandemic, not least in the care sector. This sends a clear negative message that, in today’s sometimes distorted view of the value of different jobs to society, we do not appreciate the contribution they make and the skills they bring In the Commons last week, a Home Office Minister said that the reason that care workers had been excluded from the qualifying list for the health and care visa was because the Government had a "vision" for the social care sector that it should no longer carry on looking abroad to recruit at or near the minimum wage, and that the Government’s priority was that, in future, care sector jobs will be "valued, rewarded and trained for, and that immigration should not be an alternative."—[Official Report, Commons, 13/7/20; col. 1250] If that means significantly better rates of pay in the underpaid social care sector, I am sure it will have widespread support. However, yesterday the Government said that with the vast majority of social care workers employed in the private sector their "ability to influence pay rates there is limited" Since there are already 100,000 vacancies in England’s care sector alone, and the current flow of people from abroad to fill low-paid care sector jobs is about to dry up, how have the Government been able to satisfy themselves not only that UK-based workers will immediately step in to fill that gap but that they can lower vacancy levels in the social care sector If higher pay rates materialise in the social care sector, as a result of the points-based immigration system, there will presumably be an increase in the cost of providing social care. Who will finance those higher costs? Will it be the elderly care home residents and residents receiving care at home? Will it be already cash-strapped local authorities, or will the providers of care provision have to absorb the costs? Or does the Government’s vision extend to them financing the additional costs of a welcome improvement in pay in the social care sector? Perhaps the Government could provide an answer to that question in their response at the end of this debate The Government have said that ending free movement from the EU plus the future points-based immigration system should reduce net migration. On what basis have the Government come to that conclusion, bearing in mind that net migration from outside the EU, where there is no free movement, exceeds net migration from the EU, where there is free movement Perhaps the Government’s conclusion is an indication that, in the absence of publicly declared targets for net migration, they expect their approach to deter sufficient numbers of people from seeking to come and work here, in which case the hostile environment approach may still exist in spirit, if not officially in name. What happens and what is said during the passage of the Bill may throw some light on that. We will have to see whether some amendments to the Bill are accepted, or whether the absence of any movement on the Bill in the Commons really means a Government which think they are 100% right and that an alternative approach on anything related to the Bill is 100% wrong.