New Clause 7 - Interpretation of Refugee Convention
Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Bill
10:00 am
Ms Beverley Hughes (Minister of State (Citizenship and Immigration), Home Office; Stretford and Urmston, Labour)
There are two points here. There is a great deal of work going on—not only by IND, but by parts of our security services which work with us on intelligence-gathering in operations outside the UK—trying to ensure that people in source countries understand those issues and the risks, the exploitation to which they become prey by paying people to transverse them across the continent. It might be that we can do more in that regard, but we are trying to include getting those messages across as part of our overall strategy on this.
I must clarify one point. As I think I made clear to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight, the provisions in article 31 of the refugee convention do not allow a country to decline to consider a claim. Rather, it tells the member state concerned that should somebody be liable to prosecution because they have not claimed asylum, that person will not have a defence under article 31 if they have not come directly and not availed themselves of the opportunity, if they could do so, to claim in another country. It is about the offence, and penalising people; it is not about not considering somebody's claim. That is why it would technically be possible to prosecute somebody we have decided is a refugee, although many countries may not want to do that. Article 31 is about that person's defence, which they may or may not have, depending on how they got to the state concerned.