Extract from oral answer
(Lords) on Asylum: British Overseas Territories and
Ferries
(CB): My Lords, will the noble Baroness at
least accept that the answers to the root causes of why 70.8
million people are displaced worldwide will not be found on
Ascension Islandor disused oil rigs or ferries,
and that we must urgently tackle those root causes and bring people
together who will look for them? Will she also accept support for
the Home Secretary’s call for legal routes for those who are at
genuine risk of harm and for the Government’s determination to
tackle criminal gangs involved in the trafficking of migrants, and
say when detailed plans on that will be published?
The Minister of State, Home Office () (Con): I am very pleased to agree with the noble
Lord. In fact, he and I spoke the other day about our absolute
agreement on how, if we can find the root causes and tackle them,
we will cut out some of the criminality around this. My right
honourable friend the Home Secretary was absolutely serious
yesterday about pursuing those legal routes, because they are the
way to run the system.
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Extract from report
stage (Lords) of the Immigration and Social Security
Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill
(CB)
[V]: I support Amendment 20 and will address the asylum angle. Ms
Patel is quite right that the asylum system is broken, but the
repairs that are required need not—must not—mean recourse to
water cannons or wave machines, disused oil rigs or ferries,
Ascension Island or Papua New Guinea, all of
which would mean further breaches of international law, this time
the refugee convention...
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Extract from second
reading (Commons) of the Covert Human Intelligence Sources
(Criminal Conduct) Bill
(Coventry South) (Lab):...This Bill marks the latest
step in a frightening descent into authoritarianism by this
Government. In the past two weeks, they have proposed the
effective decriminalisation of torture by British soldiers
overseas, the shipping of asylum seekers more than 4,000 miles
away to be imprisoned on Ascension Island the
ban on anti-capitalist teaching materials in schools and now
this—licensing undercover agents to commit torture, sexual
violence and murder. This descent into authoritarianism should be
a concern to us all. It must be resisted...
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