Clause 11 - Unfounded human rights or asylum claim
Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Bill
9:10 am
Mr David Heath (Somerton and Frome, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move amendment No. 150, in
clause 11, page 13, leave out lines 9 and 10 and insert
'entitled to reside in the State or part and that the claimant—
(a) confirms that he is within that description, or
(b) can be shown by documentary evidence to be within that description.'.
Good morning, Mr. Taylor. I welcome you to the Committee. It is also good to see the Minister of State back in her place.
The clause deals with the so-called white list. Liberal Democrat Members have serious reservations about the white list process and the change that the Government propose to that process. Our amendment is narrowly drawn. It would simply leave out lines 9 and 10 and insert a slightly crisper and more evidentially based form of words.
I shall not digress into the consequence of the clause in totality. That can be properly debated under later groups of amendments. At this stage, I shall say simply that we are seeking to put at least some constraint on the discretion of the Secretary of State to form an opinion and, on the basis of that opinion, to apply that part of the clause.
If the amendment were successful, there would have to be some substantiated evidence for the Secretary of State's opinion. It could be argued that the Secretary of State's opinion could be challenged in any case if it were held to be improper by judicial review, but I am trying to obviate that process. We should not encourage matters to be challenged in the courts. I would expect the Secretary of State to have a degree of evidence for his assertion that a person was of a particular group before making the declaration that is inherent in the operation of clause 11.
That is a brief explanation of the basis for the amendment. I hope to widen the scope of the debate under later amendments with regard to what the Government intend but what I have said so far is sufficient to introduce the debate.