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Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

Apropos the earlier debate, I am not normally known for supporting the Government as some sort of knee-jerk reaction. I hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench who has just spoken will draw this accolade to the attention of the Chief Whip, who might need to be revived with smelling salts after he has been told that those remarks were made. A lot of soul-searching is going to be needed about the Bill. My fundamental instinct, though, is that that soul-searching will be not just because of the Bill but because we do not know how to go forward on the question of social integration. I shall put that another way round: for donkeys’ years a lot of activities, and I include trade union activities, have done a lot of work to promote social integration and so on, but it is directed particularly at immigrants, for obvious reasons. I agreed with the thrust of the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, but, unless I misheard her, she was saying that there are things that people who are born in this country do not have to do. No, she did not say that. I am sorry; I was trying to go along with the spirit of what she was saying.