Labour rebellion on asylum bill
The government had to fend off a backbench rebellion yesterday over controversial plans to clamp down on asylum abusers.
A sizeable contingent of Labour MPs rejected the government’s flagship Asylum and Immigration Bill at its second reading, as it appeared to contain clauses that would make children “destitute.”
Overall 287 MPs voted on the amendment, with 78 members opposing the legislation as it stood.
Twenty-three Labour MPs voted against the government. The government’s massive majority in the Commons was cut to 209.
Rebel Labour MPs argue the legislation could see children taken into care if their parents refused to voluntarily leave Britain.
The government’s own side is also concerned the bill may reduce asylum-seekers’ rights to appeal against decisions that deny refugee status.
And a group of refugee and human rights organisations – Amnesty International, the Refugee Council and the Refugee Legal Centre – branded the Bill ‘devastating’ as it “denies asylum seekers a fair hearing.”
Labour MP Hilton Dawson, who tabled the rebel amendment, warned ministers they were “taking us a step far too far.”
“It seems extraordinary to have to say this to a Labour government but you should never, ever under any circumstances whatsoever, whatever the parents have done, whoever they are, wherever they’ve come from, remove the basic means of substance from children,” he said.
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Mark Oaten said Mr Blunkett’s plans went was “a step too far.”
“The idea that to tackle immigration, you take away levels of natural justice by removing the level of appeal and that you start having a media game by using children as a threat to remove asylum seekers, I think is a step too far.
“They are removing benefits from families with children and they have said that a consequence of that may very well be that children need to go into care. I think that is wrong.”
