HC Deb 28 March 1985 vol 76 cc649-50
29. Mr. James Lamond

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement about the meeting of the Minister of State, the hon. and learned Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Waddington) with the Divided Families Campaign on 4 February.

Mr. Waddington

The Bangladesh Divided Families Campaign from Oldham requested the meeting to voice its concern that families are separated by the operation of immigration control. I listened carefully to the views expressed on this and other topics, but I had to make the point that families are separated not by the actions of the Government, but by the actions of those who choose to come here leaving their families behind.

I told the campaign that it was necessary for those claiming to be dependants to establish their entitlement and I could not set aside the requirement of the immigration rules and allow people waiting in the queue, or who had had their application refused, to come here when they had not shown their entitlement.

Mr. Lamond

Is the Minister aware that the Divided Families Campaign now operates on a national basis because so many families are affected? Does the Minister accept that we are talking about the humane treatment of families, which is quite separate from other immigration matters? Is the Minister aware that he could take a decisive step to help those families if he ensured that the queue to be interviewed was shortened and if he placed more interviewing officers in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan?

Mr. Waddington

Yes. The problem is intractable. There is a limit to the resources available to process entry clearance applications. I remind the hon. Gentleman that the year before last we sent an additional entry clearance officer to Dhaka. In the last two winters, two extra entry clearance officers have been helping with the preparation of appeals statements there so that entry clearance officers had more time to do the interviewing.

One must compare the situation today with that of a few years ago. Generally, queue lengths today compare favourably with the queue lengths back in 1979 and 1978. However, a real problem exists in Dhaka because so many people in the queue are reapplicants. We do our best.

Mr. Kaufman

How can the Minister say that these families are not divided by the action of the Government, when the document leaked to The Guardian shows that there is a conspiracy in his Department, led by him, deliberately to spin out the queues and get round the law which allows people to exercise their right to come here? By the leaking of that document, a copy of which I have, has the hon. and learned Gentleman not been shown to be deliberately pursuing a restrictive and racist policy?

Mr. Waddington

It is this intemperate language which proves the point that I was making half an hour ago. It does not help when, time and time again, the right hon. Gentleman gets up at Question Time, completely misrepresents the policy being pursued and completely obscures the fact that by and large that policy has been pursued by successive Governments. The truth of the matter is that the Labour Government realised perfectly well that there was a limit on the resources that could be dedicated to the job of entry clearance in Dhaka. We have followed exactly the same policy. We have recognised that there is that same limitation. Obviously, if we cannot devote unlimited manpower to doing the job there is a limit to the rate at which people will be admitted. It is as simple as that, and the right hon. Gentleman knows it perfectly well.