Tom
Brake: The Minister says that the new clause is imperfect,
in that it will have unintended consequences in relation to parity with
soldiers from the Commonwealth. However, it would have been within the
Minister’s remit
to address the issue himself. If there were imperfections in the new
clause, he could have dealt with them. He did not deal with the
question of guidance being exactly that. I understand that civil
servants can disregard guidance. I presume that it can relatively
easily be modified—changed, deleted, added to and so on. We have
an opportunity in the Bill to address the issue in a more permanent way
than that which is currently offered by the guidance. The Government
should have taken that opportunity, and I therefore intend to stick
with my new clause and not withdraw the motion that it be read a Second
time. Question
put, That the clause be read a Second
time. The
Committee divided: Ayes 1, Noes
6.
Division
No.
10] Question
accordingly
negatived.
New Clause
8Probationary
citizenship leave: homelessness
assistance ‘(1) The
Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 (c. 33) is amended as
follows. (2) After subsection
(6) of section 118 (housing authority accommodation)
insert— “(6A) For
the purposes of this section a person subject to immigration control
does not include a person who has probationary citizenship
leave.”. (3) After
subsection (4) of section 119 (homelessness: Scotland and Northern
Ireland)
insert— “(5) For
the purposes of this section a person subject to immigration control
does not include a person who has probationary citizenship
leave.”.’.—(Tom
Brake.) Brought
up, and read the First
time.
Tom
Brake: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second
time.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to
discuss
New clause
9—Qualifying period to provide education and health
protection— ‘(1) A
person under the qualifying period shall be treated as a person settled
in the United Kingdom for the purposes of all regulations made
under— (a) the Health
Services and Public Health Act 1968 (c.
46); (b) the Education (Fees
and Awards) Act 1983 (c.
40); (c) the Education and
Libraries (Northern Ireland) Order 1986 (S.I., 1986/594 (N.I.
3)); (d) the National Health
Service (Charges to Overseas Visitors) Regulations 1989 (S.I.,
1989/306); (e) the Teaching and
Higher Education Act 1998 (c.
30); (f) the Education (Student
Support) Regulations (Northern Ireland)
1998; (g) the Learning and
Skills Act 2000 (c. 21);
(h) the Higher Education Act 2004 (c. 8);
and (i) the Higher Education
(Northern Ireland) Order 2005 (S.I., 2005/1116 (N.I.
5)). (2) In section 115 of the
Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 (c. 33) (exclusion from
benefits), in subsection (9) after “EEA state”, insert
“or a person with probationary citizenship
leave”.’.
Tom
Brake: With these two new clauses—the last, I
think, to be debated today—we return to the issue of
probationary citizenship, which is a matter that we discussed in one of
last week’s sittings. I will deal with the new clauses together
because they both relate to what constitutes probationary citizenship.
The Government’s view is very much that probationary citizenship
is not about citizenship, but that it is a stage at which citizenship
has not been reached. The new clauses state that probationary
citizenship is citizenship that has been achieved but is under
probation—if people understand the semantic difference. The new
clauses, therefore, are looking at ensuring that assistance is
available through local authorities to deal with
homelessness—the subject of new clause 8—and looking at
what assistance is available and what fees should apply when seeking to
access services such as education and health—new clause
9. As
the Minister is aware, under the current proposals a holder of
probationary citizenship would be ineligible for 15 different benefits
that are available to those with indefinite leave to remain, and
overseas rates would apply for further and higher education. That means
that people whom we are hoping will soon become citizens of the United
Kingdom and whose circumstances will often be difficult will find it
hard to afford further and higher education, in particular, and may
find themselves unable financially, for example, to access the national
health service. It is an issue of principle about what probationary
citizenship is, how we should view people who are going through that
phase and how they should be treated in comparison with what applied
previously in relation to indefinite leave to remain. I hope that the
Minister will consider the new clauses
carefully. 2.15
pm
Damian
Green: The hon. Gentleman is asking a perfectly valid
question. Presumably, the new clauses would, among other things,
entitle a group of people to benefits earlier than they would be
entitled under the Government’s proposals. I shall ask him the
question that he asked me a few minutes ago: what costings will be
involved and what will be their
effect?
Tom
Brake: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question. I
have to be honest and state that I do not have the precise figures.
When the Minister responds, perhaps he will set out the projections for
such a change. The new clauses still enable us to debate the principle
of probationary citizenship and people’s perception of what a
probationary citizen should be, matters to which I hope the hon.
Gentleman will also
respond.
Mr.
Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for tabling the
new clauses because they allow us to explore an area that we did not
deal with specifically in our earlier debates. The fundamental tenet of
the proposals for the path to citizenship idea is that the rights and
benefits of citizens are reserved for those who have earned the right
to them——the route that we have discussed before. The
Government recognise the significant contribution to this country both
economically and socially that migrants can make. Nevertheless, it has
been a long-standing policy that those entering the United Kingdom on
the work or family route are expected to support themselves without
access to benefits. There are, of course, some caveats to that,
particularly in respect of the primary care and accident and emergency
areas of public health, where it is clearly in everyone’s
interests that that should be the
case. All
Members will know the phrase, “recourse to public funds”.
It was dealt with in part 6 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 and
has existed for many years. People on temporary leave to remain under
those routes do not have access to benefit. That view is supported
widely and we believe that that policy should be clarified in respect
of the probationary citizen proposals, so that everyone is clear that
those benefits derive from citizenship but not from probationary
citizenship. For
the avoidance of doubt, I want to be clear that such a provision does
not apply to migrants on the protection route. They are dealt with
separately. It is right, given the special circumstances that led
people on that route to the United Kingdom, for them to get access to
benefits if asylum is granted. I am not talking about cases in which
asylum has not been granted; there are different arrangements
there. The
restrictions on access to benefits and services at the probationary
citizen stage will apply to migrants on the work route—highly
skilled and skilled workers under tiers 1 and 2 of the points-based
system. Secondly, the restrictions will apply to those on the family
route—that is, family members of British citizens and, slightly
different, under the current category of permanent residents. Further,
those people on the family and work routes will have full access to
national insurance contribution-based benefits on the same basis as
others. Those benefits are contribution-based jobseeker’s
allowance, contribution-based incapacity benefit, contributory
employment and support allowance, retirement pension, maternity
allowance and bereavement benefit. If someone has been paying tax and
national insurance—they have made a contribution—they are
of course entitled to get their money back, to put it in colloquial
terms. That will apply with probationary citizenship. What is not
applied under our proposals are the non-contributory benefits, which
the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington is probing and pushing
on. We do not believe that to be anti-foreigner in any way. We are
putting forward to the probationary citizen arrangements whereby, if
people want to become citizens and build a life in our country, they
will need to demonstrate through the criteria discussed what is
available to them. That does not include the non-contributory
benefits. The
proposed new clause gives probationary citizens access to social
housing and homelessness assistance in Scotland and Northern Ireland. I
am not point-scoring, but it does not do that for England and Wales. I
do not know whether that was deliberate, but if it was, I thought it
was extremely clever, because it made it more difficult for me, given
the position of the Scottish
Executive. The
situation at the moment is that, once granted indefinite leave to
remain, a migrant gets full access to benefits, subject to the same
eligibility criteria as everyone else, apart from the right to vote, if
one includes that as a benefit. Currently, an economic migrant will
normally
be entitled to apply for ILR after five years in the UK, and a spouse
after two years. The benefits available once a migrant is granted ILR
include income support, employment and support allowance, housing
benefit, carer’s allowance, disability living allowance and
access to local authority
housing. Under
the earned citizenship proposals, by way of contrast, the economic
migrant will access mainstream benefits and social housing, if they are
successful, six years after arrival. It may help the
Committee if I refer, for the record, to the latest impact assessment,
of June 2009, which gives some statistics estimating the range of
potential transfers to be in the order of £860 million to
£2.1 billion over a 10-year period. I caution against comparison
with the earlier figure of £350 million, which if my memory
serves me was over a five-year period. The difference reflects that, as
time passes, the policy kicks in for more people. The assumptions
in the impact assessment are in annexe A, I believe at
paragraph
42. The
legislation has got things right, based on the long-standing principle
of access to public funds. If such a clause to meet that objective were
in place—I may be being unfair, as the hon. Member for
Carshalton and Wallington is asking a question as much as making a
proposal—the cost would run into significant billions of pounds.
Having said that, as everyone who deals with such matters knows, access
to benefits is a complex area because one also has to look at the
situation of the spouse. The no recourse to public funds test applies
to the spouse who may get, or may argue for, access consequential to
the arrival of the spouse. That is an important point, which makes the
area extremely complex.
Say a wife
with children comes from America to live with her spouse in this
country and that entitles the family to access to benefits that the
father would not get on his own, and so on. There are also examples in
reverse. Under our earned citizenship proposals, there are no such
complications that I am aware of—I say with my hand on my heart.
I hope that the principle behind this is accepted. I believe that it
achieved consensus in the other place. I do not think that there was a
division on that point.
Damian
Green: I sense that the Minister is drawing to a close.
One thing that has yet again sprung out of this debate is how
unfortunate the phrase “probationary citizenship” is.
Because of the history of the usage of the word in this country,
probation sounds like something given when an offence has been
committed. I am sure that before all this eventually passes, it cannot
be beyond the wit of Ministers and their officials to come up with a
better phrase, such as “qualifying citizenship”. In the
scheme of things, that is a relatively trivial point, but the current
wording sends out the wrong message, so I hope that the Minister can
find another word.
Mr.
Woolas: I have known the hon. Gentleman for 20
years—we have worked together in different capacities—and
he is consistent in his liberalism on this matter. I understand the
point that he makes. I have checked the definition of probation, and as
he says, it is normally used in the context of someone who is on
probation. In Oldham, that means that if someone misbehaves they go
back into the clink. Its proper meaning is not punitive although we
have not come up with a better term. The
word makes the point that someone is aspiring to citizenship, rather
like an apprentice in a workplace who is aspiring to be a skilled
worker. In my experience, the apprentice is proud of that title because
it implies a self-esteem that is leading to a status and it should be
seen in that context. I advise the Committee to look at the
word’s literal translation into Urdu, where it does not have the
context that the hon. Gentleman asks about. I did check that, although
not for any reasons of self-interest, God forbid.
The impact
assessment makes its assumptions on numbers that are our best
guesstimates based on previous experience of applications for
probationary citizenship. I would not want the migration group to take
those figures and say that they are our projections of what will
actually happen in terms of numbers because it will draw wrong
conclusions and probably project the population of the country to be
120 million within five years. I slightly jest, but we can base our
impact assessment only on our knowledge so far.
I will not
read out the benefits that are affected in the list in front of me
because it runs to two pages. However, I hope that I have made the
point that it is fair that contributory benefits should be available,
but non-contributory benefits should not.
2.30
pm
Tom
Brake: May I pick up on the point made by the hon. Member
for Ashford on whether “qualified” or, possibly
“transitional” is a better word than probationary? That
is the point I was making about the belief that people have in the
person who is seeking to become a citizen. I agree that describing that
phase as “probationary citizenship” is regrettable,
because it casts doubt on that applicant’s probity. I hope that
the Minister can find a different phraseology.
I listened
carefully to the Minister. Clearly, it was not the intention that the
proposed new clause should apply only to Scotland and Northern Ireland.
For that reason alone, I will not press the matter to a Division. He
has done a good job of explaining some of the issues relating to the
proposed new clauses, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
clause.
Clause, by
leave,
withdrawn.
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