Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-15
Topic: Immigration
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Roberts of Llandudno, who reminds us of the moral obligations that we have to a child or someone who is not quite a child any longer in the eyes of the law, when in effect the state has been that child’s parent up to the age of 18 I am glad that the right reverend Prelate went ahead of me, as he said much of what needs to be said. I find the "deport first, appeal later" policy—as it has come to be called—difficult to tackle because I dislike the whole thing so much and am very frustrated that we have to approach it crab-wise because of it being a manifesto commitment. However, this does not at all detract from the importance of recognising how children’s interests can properly be dealt with in the way that this amendment seeks to do The right reverend Prelate said that he was concerned about the Government’s Amendment 145. However, I oppose Amendment 145, as by saying that Section 55 applies, all it does is put in doubt the application of Section 55 in other circumstances unless it is said that Section 55 applies. That is nonsense. The noble and learned Lord will appreciate that that cannot be what is meant and I hope he will appreciate that there is a danger, however good the Government’s intentions, in trying to confirm the application of Section 55 to us in this way, although I do not wish to be bought off by that I think the right reverend Prelate said that the child’s "voice" needs be heard. That struck me very much in the helpful briefing from the Refugee Children’s Consortium, in which it says: "Crucially, there is … no mechanism by which children’s own views are systematically"— the word systematically is probably important— "considered by the Home Office" I appreciate that the Minister is bound not to be able to accept this from the Dispatch Box, but the consortium has told us that, "best interests assessments are rarely conducted in any meaningful way, if at all. The Home Office routinely takes as their start and end point that the children’s best interests are met by being with both parents. They rarely, if ever, consider the child’s current circumstances, their likely future circumstances, the child’s own views"— as I said— "the parents’ likely circumstances on return and how they will impact on the child before making a decision" It also tells us: "There is also no evidence that the Home Office proactively seek to find out whether any of the children within a family liable for removal might have a right to British citizenship" For all those reasons, and the four pages of briefing which Ministers can see me dangling, I very much support Amendment 114 I have some amendments in this group in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Paddick. Amendments 113A and 114A deal with the position if, having been deported, an appeal is successful. The individual will have been made to leave the UK only temporarily, as it will turn out, against his or her wishes. I understand that there is guidance in connection with deportation that consideration must be given to the Home Office paying for the journey back. I would say in parenthesis that regard must be had to the quality of the Home Office decision. I do not know whether the noble and learned Lord can tell the House how the quality is assessed: is it a matter of comments made by the tribunal? It also occurs to me that if an appellant is not legally represented, will he know whether to raise the issue of payment for return to this country? In any event, my amendments are not about deportation, they are about administrative removal. If the administrative removal is wrong, the Administration should bear the costs of return to the UK Amendment 113B would prevent the certification of cases of persons with the characteristics specified in the amendment, so that such a person could not be required to leave the UK while the appeal was pending. The Minister will recognise how that aligns with cases of people who are vulnerable—if not "particularly" vulnerable, to use the word in Amendment 86. They are children, care leavers, persons with mental illness or learning disabilities, people who have been trafficked or enslaved, people who have claims based on domestic violence or are overseas domestic workers. For reasons which we spent some time on when debating the previous group of amendments, Ministers will understand our concern to pay particular attention to the need not to expose people who have such characteristics to the possibility of further damage.