New Clause 5
Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [Lords]
2:00 pm
Damian Green (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Ashford, Conservative)
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing us a quick run round the Gurkha course again. Enough has been said on the subject of Joanna Lumley and on ambushes, but I must say that one of the Minister’s unique places in history, for which he will be immortalised, is as the only middle-aged man in history who looked that uncomfortable that close to Joanna Lumley. [Laughter.] As has been said, it cannot have been his most enjoyable week.
The serious question that I put to the Minister is, what is now happening? It would be useful to know. We had the Sturm und Drang of the parliamentary defeat and the Government U-turn, but there has been a deafening silence ever since, so this is the ideal time for him to at least give the Committee a timetable for putting into effect what the then Home Secretary told the House and explain what the new system will be and how it will work. I appreciate that there are many details to work out, but the Government have had several weeks in which to do that.
It goes without saying that we all admire and respect what the Gurkhas have been doing and still do for this country. We believe that they have done great service that deserves not only our respect, but the reward of being allowed to settle in this country. It would be better, not least for the Minister’s comfort, if there was no sense that the eventual solution was being delayed, because otherwise he will have the Gurkha campaigners on his back again. My friendly advice is that I do not think that that would be a happy or healthy position for him to be in.