---

Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

We have skated around the question of training on and off this afternoon, but these amendments direct us to it. Amendments 21 and 22 probe the standard of training to be provided and the standard of competence to be achieved before an immigration officer or other official may be designated by the Director of Border Revenue under the power in Clause 11. We said on Second Reading that we would table amendments to satisfy ourselves about the terms and level of training. We now know the terms, because the Minister has given them to us, but we do not know the level or the content. One of our chief worries is that officials may be struggling with their existing duties. How are they then meant to understand, retain and apply borders, customs, immigration and, in some cases, police provisions all at the same time and ensure that they do not get into difficulties? We want to ensure that the standard of training is sufficiently rigorous to meet those concerns. That is why we suggest that the word ““adequate”” in page 8, line 41 should be removed and substituted with ““all necessary””. Matters such as tax revenues, tax raising and all the other things that they are entitled to do and must do need to be included in training. We need to be sure that it will be more than adequate and that the director can be truly satisfied that all those who are to be the composite trinity know what they are doing. I beg to move.