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Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Bill

I hear your injunction, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and will proceed with what I have to say about the Bill. However, the hon. Gentleman’s representations were considered, as was my commitment to the House. I am not going to comment in detail on individual cases, but the issues are as I set out. Every individual case, including representations from Members, will be carefully considered. The approach taken in the five-year strategy was to identify four major streams of work. First, we wanted to establish a single points system for those coming to the UK to work or study. That would be designed to ensure that we target those workers that the UK most needs, that we simplify the current system so that it is easier for employers and applicants to use and for the public to understand, and that we make it more robust against abuse. That will be accompanied by measures to tighten our rules for permanent settlement and to simplify the appeals system. We will consult before the summer on what the new system might look like, but the legal measures needed in primary legislation to deal with that are covered in clauses 1 to 10 and 42 to 44. The second aspect to the strategy is that the Government are introducing a new asylum process, building on the major successes that we have had in reducing abuse of the system and speeding up the treatment of applications. The reduced asylum intake will enable us to fast-track almost all new cases and to maintain contact with asylum seekers at key points in the process, so that we are in a better position to remove individuals whose claims are not justified. The new process will be simpler and more effective for genuine refugees and it is complemented by a new strategy of refugee integration, which we published in March this year. Most of this part of our proposals will be dealt with by changes to administrative processes and by changes to the immigration rules through secondary legislation. Clause 38 develops our strategy of refugee integration effectively. The third part of our proposals establishes a fully integrated immigration control that is intelligence-led and uses new technology to check people before they depart for the UK, on arrival, while they are here and on departure from the UK. By 2008, we will fingerprint all visa applicants, who will have their details checked before they can board aircraft for the UK under the e-borders programme. Identity cards will help us to ensure that people do not work illegally or fraudulently claim access to services and benefits. We will check people out of the UK so that we know who has overstayed. Those checks will be supported by measures to crack down on employers of illegal workers and by closer working with the airlines to deal with individuals who use forged documents or who destroy them en route. Those measures are a major part of the Bill and are dealt with in clauses 11 to 36. Finally, we want to make a major new effort to increase the removal of failed asylum seekers. We will use £30 million of savings from the asylum budget to recruit 500 new front-line staff and we will continue our efforts to reach more agreements with major source countries on returns, building on the considerable successes that we have already achieved. That will help us, by the end of the year, to return more failed asylum seekers than there are new unsuccessful claims. We will achieve all of that through international co-operation—not through fortress Britain—with our European Union partners during the UK presidency by working with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and by developing partnerships with major source and transit countries for immigration. Clauses 39 to 40 cover those measures.