argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Immigration
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, my name is also to this amendment on behalf of these Benches, and I am glad to have the opportunity again to support our head terrier and add my yap to the debate Rights are significant, but they are of no use if you do not know you have them and do not appreciate that because nobody has told you about them. It is the state, of course, that should. Something less than citizenship is not the same as citizenship. An immigration status is not as good as citizenship for all sorts of reasons, some of which we rehearsed in Committee, and some of which have been mentioned today. I am glad so many noble Lords have talked to the position of the Roma people Those with rights should be encouraged to exercise them, not discouraged. It would be a reassurance to those waiting to see the hard evidence of the lessons learned from the Windrush inquiry if the Minister could report progress. Like the noble Lord, I was impressed by listening to Wendy Williams. I heard that event some months ago, when I had a little more energy to log on to online events. I was impressed by her observations about cultural issues I also agree with the committee, which stressed the importance of curiosity. It is necessary to stand in other people’s shoes to be able to respond properly to a problem However, given how much we have to get through today, I will not say more than this: what Parliament intended to put into law in 1981 should be observed. The report, as proposed by the noble Baroness, would be an important step towards this.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Immigration
Brian Paddick (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I support my noble friend’s amendment and the powerful, eloquent arguments he put forward, honed by the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and the compelling arguments of the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, and supported by every other speaker so far in this debate I hate to bore the House by repeating what I have said before about those entering the United Kingdom to visit, without a visa, who want to rent a property for the six months they will be here. The Government say that these people—and from 1 January they will be EEA and Swiss nationals—have to produce to the landlord physical proof of their nationality and the fact that they entered the United Kingdom within the last six months It has been confirmed to me by the Minister that there are no plans to have any digital proof of the status of those EEA and Swiss nationals visiting for six months that a landlord would be able to access to confirm that they can rent the property. So, we have a situation where, if an EEA or Swiss national, after 1 January, wants to rent a property for more than six months, they need a digital-only proof that it is possible, but if the EEA national has entered the United Kingdom within the last six months, it is solely physical proof that the landlord needs. There are no plans to change that process in the future. So, any argument that the Government are moving to a wholly digital system in the future is not true, certainly in relation to the circumstances I have outlined, which, therefore, knocks away a major argument of the Government’s against this amendment.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Civil Rights
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, this debate would not be complete without thanking the very many individuals who have been in touch with noble Lords to express their strong views and very real concerns, nor would it be complete without thanking the 3million—although perhaps that organisation should be called "the almost 4 million", as we now know. We have to thank every voluntary organisation, the many people affected and those making their views heard, as well as the few who work so hard on their behalf and have been so effective in passing those views on to us. The Minister in Committee made a long, careful speech which, on rereading, did not seem to address the amendments but rather was a speech responding to what she expected to hear, not to the individual points that were made. The noble Baroness, Lady Bull, has again spoken about people in abusive and coercive relationships, as she did then, and about people with impaired capacity, but there was no answer about the latter. With regard to the former, the Minister said: "We are committed to delivering a service that reflects the diverse needs of all users."—[Official Report, 14/9/2020; col. 1094.] How does that answer the point? Coercive control could cause—I was going to say "just"; it is not "just", but noble Lords will understand what I mean—not just a difficulty in renting or a lack of getting the job that one wants; it could actually mean trapping the individual in that relationship I mentioned Australia at the last stage, as some noble Lords have done today, and the length of time it had taken to make everyone comfortable with purely digital arrangements. The Minister commented that, in Australia, the physical documents are issued in the form of biometric cards. Again, how did that answer the point? This amendment is not opposing the digital system; it is about having additional physical proof for those who ask for it From time to time, a proposition in this House takes off because there is something about it that feels very real; noble Lords support it intuitively—and sometimes rationalise that intuition after they have come to the view. The intuition tells them that they have got their fingers on the pulse of opinion. It also, in this case, resonates with our appreciation of citizens who have been a part of our community and who we want to see remaining as part of our community I congratulate the speakers who I know do not want to go against their own Front Bench but who are prepared to speak out—I do not suppose that they enjoy doing so. The debate has been impassioned and almost unanimous. I cannot offer the Minister a halo, but she will have an opportunity after the vote, which I expect to be overwhelming, to pass on noble Lords’ arguments and the strength of feeling. She can do that behind the scenes. She is so respected in this House, and I hope that knowing that will buoy her in the task in front of her, because we must achieve this change.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Immigration
Susan Garden (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, this identity card-related amendment is a risk-free, concrete and straightforward solution to one of the problems thrown up by the end of free movement Junior groups travel all around the country, but many travel to seaside and rural locations where they have a positive and very welcome effect on the local economy, helping shore up jobs in language schools, accommodation, leisure and hospitality, from homestay providers to coach companies, visitor attractions and local retail. All these businesses have been disproportionately affected by the Covid pandemic. As the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, set out so persuasively, removing the right to ID card travel would have a profoundly negative effect on this business at a time when we need to support its recovery wholesale Moreover, many European juniors come to the UK in successive years to take part in English language programmes, and these in turn serve as a feeder for our £20 billion higher education industry. We do not want these students to go to competitor nations and never acquire the positive impression of life and study in the UK that would lead them to choose a British university. Allowing ID card travel to continue after the end of 2020 will ensure that no one is deterred from coming to the UK in the first place A swift resolution to this issue is vital, as many language schools, exchanges and other groups of EU juniors are starting to book their visits for 2021. Many will not have travelled this year for obvious reasons and will need to feel confident that post-Brexit Britain remains as welcoming a destination as it has traditionally been, particularly in respect of children. The continuing uncertainty around ID card travel will undercut the messages of recovery and business as usual that the UK will want to promote in 2021. A swift resolution on the ID card issue will go far to create good will and confidence with our European partners and allow the soft-power benefits of exchange visits to continue into the distant future. I urge the Minister to accept this amendment.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Other
Susan Garden (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, we now come to the group beginning with Amendment 20. I remind noble Lords that Members other than the mover and the Minister may speak only once, and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this, or anything else in the group, to a Division should make that clear in the debate Amendment 20
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Immigration
John Roger Roberts (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): What a privilege it is to share these arguments with people some of whom have been here for many years. I must say how much I appreciate the work that my noble friend Lady Hamwee has done over the years in leading the Liberal Democrat camp What sort of world are we aiming for? When we look at what the present Home Secretary proposes, it is even more harsh. She does not propose any end to detention—it is indefinite. Instead she is leading a discussion—I hope it does not come to more than that—on transporting or deporting people to distant islands. The whole thing breaks the spirit of all those people who for some reason or another have found themselves in this detainee situation. The UK should be the leader in building a humanitarian approach to what will be an increasingly difficult situation as climate change and other things affect the areas of Africa that grow the grain and feed the people. The people will move. They will want a new home. Should the UK not join other nations in leading to try to find an honourable way, not one that is so heart-breaking to so many people? I ask the Government to take another look. Let it be a humanitarian look and let us go on to be rather proud not of what we have done in hostility but of what we have done in caring and hospitality.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-05
Topic: Immigration
Sarah Ludford (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I want to take up just two themes that wove through the debate in Committee. The first was about UK practice compared to that of other European countries. The Minister said in her response to the debate in Committee that "no other European country has adopted anything close to a time limit as short as that which is proposed in these amendments. Acknowledging the complexity of securing arrangements for the return of people with no legal right to remain, the European Commission itself recently proposed that a new minimum detention period of three months be put in place."—[Official Report, 14/9/20; col. 1019.] I fear that the Minister might have got tripped up by the Brussels phenomenon known as "minimum maximum", whereby the formulation "maximum of not less than" is part of a directive—or maybe a word got lost from the Minister’s speech, because the Commission’s proposal for the recast of the returns directive—a directive to which the UK of course has not opted in—actually reads: "Each Member State shall set a maximum period of detention of not less than three months and not more than six months." In other words, member states should set a maximum period of detention in their national laws. That maximum period can be between three months and six months. There is no requirement in existing or proposed EU law for individuals to be detained for a minimum of three months, which the Minister’s words might have implied, no doubt inadvertently The second theme I will mention is the Government’s contention that detention is a necessary part of efficient and effective immigration enforcement. The report on immigration enforcement from the National Audit Office in June, to which reference was made in Committee, said: "Immigration Enforcement … cites an increase in individuals making late or spurious claims for asylum … It believes many of these claims are used to delay removal but noted in 2019 that it did not have a strategy across the work of Immigration Enforcement and the rest of the Department to mitigate the abuse or to tackle the backlogs being caused by associated delaying tactics. We have not seen any systematic analysis designed to help the Department understand why claims are increasing, or to rule out if Immigration Enforcement’s own actions might have contributed to the increase." So my conclusion is that the Government have a lot of work to do across the whole field of immigration enforcement and removals. While they can rely on indefinite detention, they are not doing the work necessary to improve their systems to avoid unnecessary detention. To that end, a limit of 28 days would focus their mind on the other tools they need to have at their disposal and return detention centres to the genuine immigration removal centres that they should be.
End of Eviction Moratorium — House of Lords, 2020-09-24
Topic: Housing
Rosalind Grender (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, yesterday, in both Houses, Ministers emphasised the urgent need for private landlords to be able to evict in cases of domestic abuse. Does the Minister accept that there are currently no legal grounds on which a private landlord can evict a perpetrator of domestic abuse? Indeed, for social landlords, who can use ground 14A, this is restricted to use only after the survivor has left and does not intend to return. Will the Minister undertake to correct the record and ensure that the Government refrain, at all levels, from pursuing this damaging and misleading argument?
EU Exit: End of Transition Period — House of Lords, 2020-09-24
Topic: Immigration
Matthew Owen John Taylor (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, the Minister makes the border around Kent sound very simple, with automatic number plate recognition. Once a lorry is recognised as not having the right export documentation, who will stop it, having decided whether it is going abroad without the documentation or just making a local delivery?
Gender Recognition Act Consultation — House of Lords, 2020-09-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Elizabeth Barker (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Digitalising a system that dehumanises our fellow citizens is not kindness; it is callous and cynical, as the repeated use of the phrase "trans people and women" shows. I have one question for the Minister. Do this Government intend to amend the Equality Act or any of the guidance issued under it—yes or no?
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-12
Topic: Immigration
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, as the Minister said, the Bill is about ending free movement. From these Benches, we are no more enthusiastic about that than when the Bill started; if anything, perhaps less so, particularly because the debates have vividly demonstrated the impact on UK citizens resident in the EU and EU citizens living in the UK In our view, it is not surprising that the opportunity has been taken to pursue issues relating to the ending of free movement that have a wider context—a rather softer way of describing the various amendments that all sailed through the Public Bill Office, which is particularly careful in that regard. All the amendments have been very people-focused, which shows that there is a view of a fair and firm asylum system that is very different from the Government’s This is not the moment for long speeches, nor to rehearse the arguments on the amendments that were agreed by our House with such notable support. The noble Baroness, Lady Williams, and the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, bore with good humour all that was thrown at them, although I do not know whether they took it out on the cat when they got home. I express my thanks to our colleagues on the Liberal Democrat Benches and elsewhere in the House; to the Bill team for all their work; and, since the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, has paved the way, to Elizabeth Plummer in our whips’ office, whose assistance on the Bill has been magnificent We would like to think that we will not be discussing the various amendments again but I realise that we may well do so. In the meantime, with the obvious caveats, we support the Motion that the Bill do now pass.
Investigatory Powers (Communications Data) (Relevant Public Authorities and Designated Senior Officers) Regulations 2020 — House of Lords, 2020-09-09
Topic: Civil Rights
Brian Paddick (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, these regulations add more public authorities to the list of those who can access sensitive personal information in the form of communications data, such as itemised telephone bills. So sensitive is the issue that Parliament decided that additions to the list of public authorities had to be approved by the super-affirmative procedure. When these regulations were debated last week in Grand Committee, we were told that the Home Office had agreed to the addition of those public authorities on the basis of detailed business cases submitted to it by the public authorities concerned, which Members of this House have been unable, until 12.30 pm today, to see. The Minister agreed that it was not possible for this House to properly scrutinise the decisions of the Home Office without seeing the business cases, and that the business cases had not been published as they contained sensitive information, but said that she would arrange for Members to scrutinise the business cases in a private meeting This morning, when I saw that these regulations were due to be approved by the House, I inquired of the Minister’s office why we had not been offered a private meeting to examine the business cases. As a result of my inquiry I was emailed, at 12.06 pm this afternoon, and invited to view the business cases at 12.30. There are five business cases, and from memory, I think the Minister said that they were "lengthy". I do not think it reasonable to expect Members of this House to scrutinise five business cases, which apparently justify giving the five additional public authorities access to sensitive personal data, in the 45 minutes between the offer being made to view them and the regulations being approved on the Floor of the House. Call me old-fashioned, but I believe that this House should be given the opportunity to scrutinise regulations properly before it approves them, rather than afterwards.
International Travel — House of Lords, 2020-09-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Elizabeth Deirdre Doocey (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Does the Minister acknowledge that while international travel is something of a roulette, the Government should do everything possible to encourage a renaissance in domestic travel in the UK? The Government’s tourism industry body VisitBritain is forecasting that inbound tourism revenue will be down by £24 billion this year, which equates to about 340,000 jobs, half of which will be in London. What specific measures will the Government put in place to support London’s tourism sector, which is so reliant on inbound tourism?
International Travel — House of Lords, 2020-09-09
Topic: Immigration
Brian Paddick (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I am glad the Minister mentioned travel to Greece. When I went to a Greek island in July, I had to prove I had completed the Greek version of the passenger locator form at check-in, at the boarding gate and on arrival in Greece. When I returned from Greece to the UK, and twice when I returned from Norway in recent weeks, I was not asked if I had even completed the UK passenger locator form at any stage of those journeys, let alone asked to produce it. Why are the Government not as serious about importing Covid-19 from abroad as the Greek Government? Before imposing further restrictions on the British public, should the Government not ensure that existing measures are operating effectively?
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I should be particularly interested to see examples of what "transitory" is. The noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich, was also concerned about this. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, used the phrase "open to interpretation" and that is exactly the problem, because it allows activist lawyers to come and question. We are really on the side of the Government here, because the clearer the legislation, the easier it will be for them to enforce it, but there we go: that is not my business really, is it The Minister said that these are standard provisions. I had a very quick look at the internal market Bill shortly before this session started, because I had picked up that there are some issues in this territory—sorry, no pun intended. I could not find them, but it seems to me that the standard provisions get longer and longer. People get worried about whether a word is absolutely precisely on the point, and more words—adjectives, mostly—get added If the House agrees—we may come back to this at the next stage—that "appropriate" and "in connection with" are not appropriate for legislation because they are not clear enough and are too wide, as the rest of the clause comes under those overarching words, we will have got rid of the rest of the problem. But that is not for now and, for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-09-09
Topic: Immigration
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, some very compelling speeches have already been made. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, talked about a power grab: maybe it is just a cash grab. The Home Office seems to have managed to modify fees and charges in the past very successfully—subject, of course, to the outstanding appeal which she mentioned. Is it the case that the Home Office could not charge any fees at all to those who fall within the scope of the Bill without this power? In other words, is this limited to the ending of free movement, and the other EU-derived rights, and the position of Irish citizens As I recall, and I may be wrong, originally, a fee was proposed for applications to the EU settled status scheme. That was dropped. I thought that that was because of the outcry, but I wonder whether in fact the Home Office thought it might be challenged on the basis that a charge was ultra vires What is envisaged? Is it that these three groups of citizens will be in exactly the same position as non-EEA citizens as regards these charges? Yesterday’s events and the UK’s attitude to the Belfast agreement adds to my worry about how we will treat our friends from Ireland after the Bill comes into effect My limitation to a reduction in fees, in Amendment 21, is of course to probe the need for a power.