Immigration

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 9 March 1965.

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Photo of Mr Harold Wilson Mr Harold Wilson , Huyton 12:00, 9 March 1965

With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement.

On 25th February I said in answer to the hon. Member for Surbiton (Mr. Fisher) that the Government were urgently reviewing various aspects of immigration.

The Government believe that the problems this country is facing in connection with immigration require an attack on three broad fronts.

First, it is accepted in all parts of the House that once immigrants are here they should be treated for all purposes as citizens of the United Kingdom, without discrimination. The Government are not satisfied with progress in integrating Commonwealth immigrants into the community, particularly in some of our big towns and cities. This affects a number of Government Departments and I have invited the Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Economic Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich (Mr. Foley), to make himself especially responsible, in a personal capacity, for co-ordinating Government action in the field and for promoting through the Departments concerned the efforts of the local authorities and of voluntary bodies.

Secondly, we all agree that we cannot have first and second-class citizens in this country. We must, therefore, take vigorous measures to prevent racial discrimination. The Government intend to introduce in the very near future a Bill to deal with racial discrimination in public places and with the evil of incitement to racial hatred.

Thirdly, the House will recall the statement made by my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary on 4th February about evasion of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act by people coming from certain Commonwealth countries. My right hon. and learned Friend then indicated that the degree of evasion of existing controls was almost fatally eroding the Act. This situation arises from the use of false passports, impersonation, false statements about the purpose of travel to this country, and so on.

Since the Act is not working as was intended, a fresh examination of the whole problem of control is necessary. The Government therefore propose shortly to send a high-level mission, which will include experts in the field of immigration, to consider with certain Commonwealth Governments the problems that have arisen. The function of the mission will be to establish the facts, to examine what can be done to stamp out evasion at source, and to discuss whether new methods are needed to regulate the flow of migrants to the United Kingdom.