CURTAILMENT OF LEAVE TO ENTER OR REMAIN (Hansard, 11 January 1993)

§ Mr. Charles Wardle
I beg to move amendment No. 34, in page 5, line 7, leave out 'rejected' and insert 'given to the person notice in writing of his rejection of'.

Mr. Deputy Speaker
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Government amendment No. 35, amendment No. 8, in page 5, line 8, after 'person', insert
'at the same time as the notice of refusal'. Amendment No. 9, in page 5, line 23, after 'order', insert
'only if there are reasonable grounds to believe that the applicant will not comply with restrictions placed on him to report to an immigration officer at an appointed time;'. Amendment No. 10, in page 5, line 26, at end insert— '(5) Any decision to detain and the grounds therefor must he given to the person detained, in writing in a language which he understands.'.

§ Mr. Wardle
The amendments require that if the power to curtail a leave under clause 6 is exercised, the notice of curtailment must be served at the same time as the notice refusing the asylum application. I am pleased to repeat the assurance that I gave to the Committee that curtailment of leave will not automatically follow refusal of an asylum claim. Each case will be considered on its merits.
The key question will be whether the asylum application has raised doubts about the continuing entitlement of the person to stay in this country under the immigration rules. When it is decided at the time the asylum claim is determined that a person no longer qualifies to remain here the intention has always been that the notices should be served simultaneously: the person would be notified of the refusal of his claim, the curtailment of his leave, and the decision to make a deportation order against him. He would then be entitled to appeal to a special adjudicator against the deportation decision. Where the decision is not taken at the time the asylum application is refused, we accept that it would be wrong to leave the person uncertain as to his status in this 698 country: for example, it would be unfair to leave a student pursuing long-term studies in suspense as to whether his leave was to be curtailed at some later date. Clarification was sought in Committee about that and I am happy to give it. Amendments Nos. 34 and 35 therefore make clear the way in which the powers should be operated and I commend them to the House.
Amendment No. 9 would provide that a person could be detained only if there were reasonable grounds for assuming he would not comply with other restrictions requiring him to report to an immigration officer. This is already our practice when considering detention in immigration cases generally. It will continue to be so under the specific power in clause 6. We will exercise the power to detain only if we do not think that the person would keep in touch; and that a failure to detain would frustrate our intention to enforce departure.
Detention is not undertaken lightly. As well as having an obvious impact on the individual concerned, it is also costly and it is generally undesirable for the Department to tie up limited detention accommodation unnecessarily. However, it must remain an option for those relatively few—cases where we have reason to believe that an applicant will not co-operate or comply with other restrictions that might be placed on him.
9.15 pm
Amendment No. 10 provides that a person who is to be detained should be supplied with the reasons in writing and in a language that he understands. Few would disagree with the view that applicants should be informed about the processes affecting them, particularly where a matter as serious as detention is concerned. However, I am not convinced that such a requirement needs to be placed on the face of the Bill.
Applicants who are to be detained will be notified in person by the detaining immigration officer in a language that they can understand and via an interpreter if necessary. We are considering what written information should be given to detainees to reflect the procedures that will affect them.

§ Mr. Corbyn
Will the Minister amplify the question of the translation of information to be given to people being interviewed? The trained officers often have no access to a sufficient number of interpreters who can translate into the appropriate languages. When one asks for more unusual dialects or languages, the Home Office is unable to assist. What progress has been made in that matter? During the last round of Home Office questions, the Minister promised progress.

§ Mr. Wardle
That point will arise under a later set of amendments. I remind the hon. Gentleman that we are now discussing information on the intention to detain. That will be available in a limited number of languages. It is impracticable to expect notices to be available in every conceivable language, but every attempt will be made to explain what is happening to individuals concerned in those relatively few cases. When we discuss amendments Nos. 22, 26 and 27, I shall be pleased to comment a little further on the question of interpreters if the hon. Gentleman presses me.
I think that further written information is available in about 10 languages in the immigration detention accommodation and staff are available to deal with detainees' inquiries.
699 For those reasons, I urge the House to support amendments Nos. 34 and 35 and to reject the other amendments grouped with them.

§ Mr. Fraser
The Government amendments have met the point that I raised in amendment No. 8. Although they have not amended the Bill, the Minister has given assurances, so we shall not take the matter further. As we cannot vote against the clause, may I say that we are deeply concerned about the principle of curtailment of leave because it can discourage an application for political asylum. It is particularly severe when a student who may be doing a three-year degree course is considering whether to make an application, because the effect of applying for asylum if conditions change in the student's home country may lead not only to a refusal but to the student being returned to the country from which he appealed for safety. However, I made that point in Committee and we do not wish to divide on the matter.