tv BBC News BBC News January 16, 2024 1:45pm-2:01pm GMT
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and dark days. this is not normal, and nor should it become so. on the snp benches, we will fight this bill today, tomorrow and any day. the cuestion today, tomorrow and any day. the question is — today, tomorrow and any day. the question is that amendment 45 be made _ question is that amendment 45 be made. robertjenrette. | rise question is that amendment 45 be made. robert jenrette._ made. robert jenrette. i rise to seak in made. robert jenrette. i rise to speak in favour _ made. robert jenrette. i rise to speak in favour of _ made. robert jenrette. i rise to speak in favour of the _ made. robert jenrette. i rise to i speak in favour of the amendment made. robert jenrette. i rise to - speak in favour of the amendment in my name and that of my honourable friend,. a single question, at least on our side, hangs over this debate. what works? it doesn't matter whether this is the most robust piece of immigration legislation we have ever done. that is not relevant. it doesn't matter whether this is a suitable compromise between this faction or that. that might be a noble aim, but that's not what we are sure to do on behalf of our constituents today. what matters
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is, does the scheme work? and why does that matter? it matters because illegal migration is doing untold damage to our country. it is costing us billions of pounds. it has exploited tens of thousands of people. it is leaving a trail of human misery across europe, across north africa and beyond. people are drowning in at the english channel and continue to do so month after month. we have to fix this problem. and we end this house have the power to do so and the responsibility on our shoulders. the question is, are we willing to do it? the current bill doesn't work, and the test of whether it works is not
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whether we can get a few symbolic lights off in the months ahead with a small number of illegal migrants on them. the test is can we create the kind of sustainable deterrent that we set out to achieve? the sustainable deterrent that might write honourable friend, the member for britain, set out to achieve it when she secured this ground—breaking deal with rowan dyer. —— with rwanda. i can tell all honourable and right honourable members, having spoken to almost every interior minister and immigration minister notjust in europe, but egypt, tunisia, morocco, turkey, they all ask, when are you getting this policy up and running? will it work? and they want it to work because they know if we can create a sustainable deterrent, we
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will stop people from coming, we will stop people from coming, we will secure europe's borders, we will secure europe's borders, we will save lives. and in age of mass migration, this one of the most important challenges that we have to face. i important challenges that we have to face. . ., , , ., face. i completely agree with him about one thing _ face. i completely agree with him about one thing - _ face. i completely agree with him about one thing - i _ face. i completely agree with him about one thing - i don't - face. i completely agree with him about one thing - i don't think . face. i completely agree with him | about one thing - i don't think this about one thing — i don't think this bill will work. i don't think it will work if it has the amendments he has table in it either. that is because i think he and i come to a completely different conclusion as to the deterrence and whether it will work at all. it seems to me self evident that there must be an enormous deterrent if you have to get on a tiny without risking your life as a pregnant woman with tiny children beside you, having paid thousands of pounds to a vile, despicable people traffickers. what evidence does he have that this plan, this gimmick is any more deterrent than that? it
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plan, this gimmick is any more deterrent than that?— plan, this gimmick is any more deterrent than that? if the right honourable _ deterrent than that? if the right honourable gentleman - deterrent than that? if the right honourable gentleman were - deterrent than that? if the right i honourable gentleman were right, then hundreds of thousands of people would not be making that very journey every year. there are millions of people in the world who want to make this journey. there are thousands of people in france seeking to pay people smugglers to come to our country. the only way you'll stop this is if you break the people smugglers' business model once and for all. so that it will be clear that if you come to this country at then you will be swiftly detained and removed to rwanda or another safe country. where the honourable gentleman as long as it like he, like the labourfront bench, believe completely erroneously that you can arrest your way out of this problem. these national crime agency do not support them in that contention. i have not seen any evidence that will work. nobody who has looked into this problem believe that these are fungible and complex gangs that stretch across europe and beyond, who import votes for it next to
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nothing from china and bulgaria and turkey cannot just nothing from china and bulgaria and turkey cannotjust be arrested are of their existence. —— who import boats. i won't give way again to the right honourable gentleman. the amendments that have been brought forward in my name and that of my honourable friend in four groups, two of which will be heard and discussed today, two tomorrow, seek to address the flaws of the bill. they represent the last opportunity for others to get this policy right. let me speak directly to the one in my nine and at my write honourable friend forced down can speak to the one which he leads. mine speaks to individual claims. all my experience at the home office teaches me that
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every single illegal migrant coming to this country will try every single possible way to avoid being removed. we know that, that is what they do today. it is human nature that people would do this. you have to legislate for a human nature, not against it. every legal representative and a lefty lawyer will try everything they can to support those claims. we see it every time. experience teaches us this. the bill does improve the situation is. it makes it outer. but only in respect of the general safety of rwanda. not in respect of an individual�*s circumstance. so, as night follows day, every migrant will say that rwanda may be generally safe, and i believe it is, but it is not safe for me. that's
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one of the central intellectual incoherence is, as the government's loan lawyers have said, and the heart of this bill. it emerges that rwanda is generally safe, but for a range of unspecified reasons foresees it not to be safe for others. as we have seen in the past, one person will mount a successful challenge. every ngo will then everyone to make exactly the same challenge. time and again we will lose these cases in the courts. so the bill in that respect is legally flawed. but it's also operationally flawed. but it's also operationally flawed because of lack. let me explain to those who are not as well arrest as ministers in this field are. we only have 2013 spaces in our
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immigration removal centres in this country. on a single day in august, 1200 people arrived illegally on our shores. in a weekend, on the detain capacity in the whole uk would be consumed. so when you are considering whether this bill it works or not, see a through that lens. we have to get people out of the country within days, not months. the operational plan behind this bill foresees that people will take months to be removed from the country. so, what will happen is that our detain capacity will be filled, people will then be baled to hotels. they will then abscond and never be seen again. and within any single week in august, this scheme will have failed. that matters for the country, of course it matters
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for the government, it mattered for trust in politics and westminster, because we will have told people that i will work knowing that it will not work. and it matters for all those other european countries who want the scheme to succeed to protect our borders. i will give way to my honourable friend. i am to my honourable friend. i am crateful to my honourable friend. i am grateful to — to my honourable friend. i am grateful to my _ to my honourable friend. i am grateful to my honourable - to my honourable friend. i am grateful to my honourable friend and he is making a good case for deterrence, but i fear a bad case for his amendments. as a home affairs select committee found out, when the rwanda scheme was announced, there is a big surge of people in calais trying to... does he not acknowledge that he has just sent this is the last opportunity to get this right, that there is a very large chance that his amendments would make this bill are unworkable, not least in the eyes of the rwandan government, in which case we have no
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deterrence. so what is the solution their christmas i have known the honourable gentleman for a very long time, and he wasn't born yesterday. the argument that the rwandan government would walk away from the scheme was raised notjust at the 11th hour, one minute to midnight. it is predicated on the belief that the government of rwanda it would walk away from a scheme on the grounds that it might conceivably fall foul of the european convention on human rights, which rwanda is not itself a party too. the only reason we would fall foul of that is because of conduct in plot to excel. i don't find that a plausible argument, i'm afraid. and if it were the correct response, why then piloted bill through parliament went on at the very front page it says
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that the government cannot attest to the fact that the bill is compliant with international law. why would the prime minister say he is willing to ignore foreignjudges, when his own legal advice says that is in breach of international law. and why would we pursue a policy that the unhcr justice said yesterday it is in breach of international law. i think that is not a plausible argument from the government. i think it was and for the government to solicit that press release from the government of rwanda. i don't think we should cast by a loom on the government of rwanda, because they aren't on people who want no scheme to work. it is for that reason i want to do what we said we would do in my write honourable friend created the scheme, which is work with them in good faith to get thejob done the. work with them in good faith to get the job done the. i won't give way at the moment, let me make some more
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progress, if i may. the way the flights will work when this scheme commences is not under the illegal migration act that we passed last year at all. the first several months of flights will be through a group of individuals who might write honourable friend selected when the rwanda policy was first devised. those individuals have been in the united kingdom for months or years, many of whom we have lost contact with. none of whom can be subject to the protections in the illegal migration act. so even if you believe that the series and irreversible harm test within it a very strict one, that won't apply to the flights that will go off in the months ahead. it may not apply to any flights they go off before the next general election. so if you
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want those flights to be full of illegal migrants and it to be a deterrent effect, i think you need to support the amendments that i have set up, which create that strict approach. when we do come to those individuals who are subject to the illegal migrations act, the government's intention is that the serious and irreversible harm is a very high one. i don't think that is right. i think the supreme court was myjudgment lowers the bar. the presence of the judiciary is be generous towards illegal migrants. it is to make these scheme difficult operation wise. as this is the last legal legislative opportunity for us to tackle this issue, i suggest we get it right and we now have the opportunities for thejudiciary to opportunities for the judiciary to intervene, opportunities for thejudiciary to intervene, or else we are going to find that these flights are symbolic
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flights with very few individuals on them at all. i will give way. i flights with very few individuals on them at all. i will give way.- them at all. i will give way. i want to touch on _ them at all. i will give way. i want to touch on something _ them at all. i will give way. i want to touch on something and - them at all. i will give way. i want to touch on something and he - to touch on something and he mentioned earlier on with regards to whether it will work at all. it has very often gone on the record and saying about the albania scheme, which is very successful, there are now 90% fewer albanians coming across. in the year to september last year £200 —— migrants returned to albania did not require these amendments. the law that we currently have allowed them to be returned. i don't remember any appeals from those people. on that basis, why won't it work it already works on the albania scheme i have heard that argument in advance but that is judging to quite
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different propositions. the albania scheme is taking somebody who is in the united kingdom and asking them to return to their home country, a european country, a highly developed country. it is a very different proposition. than asking somebody, in fact not asking, enforcing somebody to be removed from the united kingdom to a third country which they do not wish to go to. also, as he may know, very few small boat arrivals have been removed to albania. almost all of those individuals who have gone to albania have been foreign national offenders in our presence, time served, individuals were voluntarily chosen to return to albania and those who have been in the united kingdom for a long time. the success of this scheme rests on taking people off small boats, detaining them for very short periods of time and then
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