European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-03-07
Topic: Immigration
Sarah Ludford (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 202, which is in the name of my noble friend Lady Smith of Newnham, who is unfortunately unable to attend because of illness. It is also in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Roberts of Llandudno and the noble Lord, Lord Judd. Before going on, I fully agree with what has been said in this debate about the need to retain EU citizenship for us all, and about the hypocrisy of some of those who supported and continue to support leave, but who have somehow managed to acquire a passport of an EU member state, such as Malta. That enables them to continue enjoying the benefits which they are quite happy to deprive the rest of us of Amendment 202 calls on the Government, "to maintain, preserve and protect the rights of", EU citizens in the UK. I therefore very much agree with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, about the fact that that has not been done. We are seeking a guarantee that existing rights will remain unchanged. The Government have had the opportunity in the last 21 months to give a unilateral guarantee that existing rights would be retained. They were invited to do so by the EU Select Committee, in a report produced under the chairmanship of the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws—I had the pleasure to serve on that sub-committee—but have not done so. They also had the opportunity to try to ring-fence the discussion about citizens’ rights from all the other matters being discussed within the withdrawal agreements but, unfortunately, they have not done that EU citizens resident in this country and British citizens resident in the EU 27 have indeed been used as bargaining chips. That has led to great distress for many of the 5 million affected citizens, who live in a state of anxiety and limbo that was not helped by the words of the Prime Minister in her speech to the Conservative Party in October 2016 about "citizens of nowhere". She has now resiled from that kind of terminology, but unfortunately the damage has been done in that the tone is somehow one of, "You do not belong here if you have multiple allegiances. It is not good enough to be a contributing and responsible person in this country". The Government still have a chance to offer unilateral guarantees and I invite the Minister to tell us today that he is going to ignore the mire into which all of this has become embroiled and just give a straightforward guarantee Many ambiguities and gaps still exist in the current state of play over the discussions about settled status. Some of the issues are being taken up in correspondence with Home Office Ministers on the part of the EU Select Committee. The problem is that settled status is not the retention of the same rights and protections that EU law currently confers on people; it is based on UK immigration law and has all the features of that law, including the hostile environment that is currently being created. People will have to apply for settled status. It will not just be a question of carryover or cut and paste—they will have to apply. Apparently, the Home Office expects the vast majority of cases to be granted, although that begs the question of which ones will not be granted to people who are currently resident here.