3. Mr. John Mark Taylorasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received concerning recent irregular attempts to gain entry to the United Kingdom, particularly by persons who destroyed their passports en route.
§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. David Waddington)I have received various representations on this issue from Members of the House, from the general public, and from organisations involved in refugee matters in this country.
Mr. TaylorIs not the destruction of passports a clear sign of bad faith on the part or such people? Will my right hon. and learned Friend accept that many of my constituents will have misgivings about the measures that he is introducing? It is not that they do not want them, but they cannot understand why I hey have taken so long.
§ Mr. WaddingtonThe simple answer is that the situation has got much worse in the past year or two. There have been more irregular movements and forged documents, and more abusive applications. To use the language of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, there were 150,000 irregular movements in Europe in 1985–86. In Belgium, where the UNHCR decides who are refugees and who are not, its advice cannot be accused of being biased. It had no fewer than 7,500 applications for refugee status and granted only 52. In this country, in February alone, 233 applications were made at the ports for refugee status, 185 by people with false documents.
§ Mr. MaddenHas the Minister had any second thoughts on the revised procedures that he outlined recently on the basis of the serious criticisms made of those revised procedures by people with long experience of trying to help those trying to seek political asylum in this country?
§ Mr. WaddingtonWe made it plain that people claiming asylum must have no expectation that their cases are bound to be referred to the United Kingdom Immigrants Advisory Service. The present arrangements do not involve reference in all cases. That is quite clear from my letter to Lord Avebury of I August 1983, and in future there will be cases where early removal will be essential and no reference will be made. There will be a meeting with UKIAS, but it will not be possible to spell out all the circumstances in which reference will not be made, so intending claimants will have no legitimate expectation that their cases will be heard.
§ Mr. JesselWill my right hon. and learned Friend look into the allegation that I have sent to him that photographs are removed from British visitors' passports sold in post offices when the gum is still wet and later replaced by photographs of other persons? Will he see what can be done to stop this?
§ Mr. WaddingtonI invite my hon. Friend to let me have full details of that allegation. I will certainly look at that with all care and expedition.
§ Mr. MeadowcroftDoes the Minister believe that the United Kingdom Immigrants Advisory Service or the British Refugee Council would connive in facilitating the entry of irregular visitors?
§ Mr. WaddingtonAll I know is that a few days had elapsed before an order was made by a court and two weeks had elapsed by the time that my right hon. Friend made his statement in this House. There is no doubt whatsoever that by the time that my right hon. Friend made his statement we were caught in what many people might describe as a legal morass. Goodness knows how long it would have taken us to extricate ourselves from it.
I must tell right hon. and hon. Members who are for ever saying that they are in favour of firm control, but as soon as there is any evasion of that control they say that they are unable or unwilling to do anything about it, that one of the main problems in this area is that if there is delay in removing people, very often the opportunity for removing them is lost for all time. No fewer than 17 Tamils were returned to southern India in the past month or two and were sent back by the Indians on the argument that they had been longer in this country while our procedures were followed than they had been in India.
§ Mr. WattsIs my right hon. and learned Friend aware that many people consider it ludicrous that those who seek to enter our country by deception should have access to UKIAS, a body funded by the British taxpayer, which can then help them in persisting in their deception?
§ Mr. WaddingtonI have made it absolutely plain where we stand on this matter. The present arrangements do not involve the reference of all cases to UKIAS. There are bound to be circumstances and cases where, in the interests of firm immigration control, it will not be right to refer cases.
§ Mr. NellistThe Minister of State said some minutes ago that the situation had become much worse over the past two years. Does he not recognise that that is because the situation in Sri Lanka has become much worse in the past two years? Did he not see the report in yesterday morning's London Daily News, which reported that 60 British mercenaries recruited by KMS, many of them ex-SAS officers, have resigned from training the Sri Lankan army—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. The hon. Gentleman must not go into that. This question is about passports destroyed en route to the United Kingdom.
§ Mr. NellistMr. Speaker—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. There is a later question on that point.
§ Mr. NellistMr. Speaker, several times in the Minister of State's replies he referred to Tamils at Heathrow. The question arises—[Interruption.]
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. The hon. Gentleman must complete his question and make it relevant to Question No. 3.
§ Mr. NellistThe reason why people have destroyed passports when trying to enter this country, given the worsening situation in Sri Lanka, was evidenced by the fact that those 60 ex-SAS mercenaries, none of them soft, resigned because—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. Mr. Waddington.
§ Mr. WaddingtonThe hon. Gentleman obviously does not have the faintest idea how refugees arrive in this country. The vast majority of people who apply for refugee status in this country have been here for a long time. They 1018 entered this country as visitors or students and then decided that they did not want to go back to their own countries or they are people who have made applications to our posts abroad. In the case of Sri Lankans, applications are actually made at our high commission at Colombo into which any Tamil can walk and outside of which only one policeman stands. It is the most natural thing in the world for a genuine refugee to go to the nearest safe place and not travel three quarters of the way around the world.
§ Mr. Gerald HowarthMy right hon. and learned Friend receives many representations from Opposition Members. Can he tell us how many he has received about the inhumanity of the Sri Lankan regime which—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. That question is also wide of the destruction of passports.
§ Mr. HowarthHow many representations has my right hon. and learned Friend received about conditions in Sri Lanka?
§ Mr. WaddingtonI cannot answer that question now, but if my hon. Friend tables a question to that effect, I shall do my best to answer it. I can tell him, however, that my postbag has been heavy during the past week or two with letters from constituents and others saying that it is about time that the Government did something about evident abuse.