Mr David Alton: Throughout the statement the Minister excluded people who are in the United Kingdom with exceptional leave to remain from falling within the "genuine" category. Does he not think that in doing so he does them a disservice and that it would have been better to have told the House that, even according to his figures, the percentage was 75 per cent. rather than 90 per cent.? Does he accept that,...
Mr David Alton: On a point of order, Madam Speaker, of which I have given you notice. You will be aware that, some weeks ago, Baroness Blatch, a Home Office Minister, announced in the other place that social security resolutions would be laid before the House on Monday next. They will come under our negative resolution procedure, so they will be eligible for debate only if a prayer is laid. Given that the...
Mr David Alton: Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. Thank you for your reply. I ask you also to look very sympathetically at an application for a Standing Order No. 20 resolution so that the matter might be debated urgently next week.
Mr David Alton: indicated assent.
Mr David Alton: rose—
Mr David Alton: I beg to move, to leave out from "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof: That this House, while recognising the need to prevent fraudulent claims for asylum, declines to give the Asylum and Immigration Bill a Second Reading because the Bill will adversely affect genuine asylum seekers; believes that designating countries as safe by order is contrary to the law and...
Mr David Alton: I shall deal with those points later in my speech. The reasoned amendment on the Order Paper on which there will be a vote this evening sets out my party's position, and I intend to say more about it. First, I want to put the debate into perspective. Justice, not numbers, should be the issue. All the evidence points not to bogus applications, but to bogus refusals and unjust determinations....
Mr David Alton: Thousands is a gross exaggeration. The figure is below 2,000. If the hon. and learned Gentleman wishes to make such interventions, he should give the House the facts. Last year, more people left the United Kingdom than arrived in it, with 215,000 people emigrating and 210,000 people immigrating, of whom 90,000 were British citizens. Just 825 were allowed here as refugees and 3,660 were given...
Mr David Alton: It is absolutely true. The recipients of mercy have a special duty to show it to others. The House should recall the last war, when a boatload of young children were repatriated to Vichy France, then sent to Auschwitz because of our failure to allow them to come to this country. I will conclude with the story of a young, middle eastern couple with no visible means of support, who would have...
Mr David Alton: May I support the hon. Gentleman in what he is saying? Surely, if the Act has served us so badly and we are having to find new legislation only three years after it was introduced, that in itself is a justification for calling witnesses to find out why it has not worked. Is there not an additional argument? Do we not need a more bipartisan approach to these matters? We seem to use such...
Mr David Alton: Does the Home Secretary accept that, despite the 4 per cent. figure that is bandied around so much, an additional 20 per cent. are accepted, even in terms of the Home Office's fairly tough criteria, as people who might be in some kind of danger, were they to return home, and are given exceptional leave to stay? Some of those cases even include torture. So although they do not fit the 4 per...
Mr David Alton: The hon. Gentleman has distorted what I said. First, I did not use the word immoral. I made it clear that I am not against gambling per se. I objected to the fact that the state is involved in a national lottery, takes substantial amounts out of it and, in the process, is destroying things like the football pools. The hon. Gentleman must be well aware that many jobs have been lost at...
Mr David Alton: I would ban tobacco.
Mr David Alton: I am diametrically opposed to the right hon. and learned Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor) on the principle of the lottery, but he has done the House a service by the way in which he has presented the arguments for improving the lottery and for ensuring that it delivers what it was established to deliver. He was right to draw our attention to the need to compensate those charities that have lost...
Mr David Alton: If the hon. Gentleman had followed the party conference in the autumn, he would have seen that the Liberal Democrats debated the national lottery and produced some thorough-going proposals, some of which are similar to those in the Opposition's motion, to improve and change the lottery. The party is not opposed to the national lottery. It was a free vote issue when we discussed it in the...
Mr David Alton: Let me advance my arguments and then I will give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr David Alton: I am coming to that. In Committee I tabled amendments to ban scratchcards, to prevent the roll-over of obscene amounts of prize money and to impose limitations on advertising, especially those targeted at young people and those living in poorer areas. Even before the national lottery, the United Kingdom had the highest per capita level of gambling anywhere in western Europe. A total of...
Mr David Alton: That is precisely what I intend to deal with. It builds up an element of hysteria and frenzy. One winner obtained £17 million, which seems an extraordinary amount of money. That creates a frenzy which fuels the national lottery. People do not consider the odds against winning. Vast numbers of people throughout the country pay massive amounts of money. The lottery is targeted at people who...
Mr David Alton: I shall move on to the liberalisation of gambling laws. The answer to the hon. Gentleman's question is straightforward. The pools and horse racing—I am not per se against any form of gambling—are not sponsored by the state. The national lottery is, and that is why it is fundamentally different. What money goes where and who decides to give it to whom? There seems to be a gaggle of the...
Mr David Alton: Of course I accept what the hon. Gentleman says. I shall take as an example one of the projects to which he referred. The Greenbank project relates specifically to disabled and handicapped people and—he would know this if he were familiar with its work—has lurched from funding crisis to funding crisis as its statutory funds have been reduced over the past few years. That raises the...
