Shabana Mahmood MP: speeches

Speeches

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  We will work with local partners, councils, philanthropists and other charitable organisations as we develop safe and legal routes. As I said in my statement, they will take three primary forms: community sponsorship, because we believe that is the best model for integrating refugees into our communities; a route for talented students; and a route for skilled workers. We want to play our full part as a country in providing sanctuary to those truly in need. We need to move to a better system. Safe and legal routes will be the way to do it in the future.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I endorse every word that she said.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I am happy to say to the hon. Gentleman that it was not misleading; it was just wrong, so I can clarify that for the record. I say to the hon. Member for Bristol Central (Carla Denyer) that I think it is a fair point of debate to point out that the Green party often indulges in hypocrisy. I shall look carefully at what her colleague has said in relation to the large military sites, but I say to her that the Green party never seems to offer any solution, only commentary that does not work.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  Apologies, Madam Deputy Speaker; in all the finger-wagging, I sort of missed the question. I think it was something about Rwanda, which I think we can all agree was a totally failed scheme and a waste of money. There are good, ongoing negotiations about return hubs, and I very much hope that we can update the House in due course.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  We will never send someone back to a country where they will be tortured—we will always abide by our international obligations in that regard. We believe that the totality of the reforms I have set out today strikes the right balance between ensuring that we continue to fulfil our international obligations and having an asylum system that retains public support for having an asylum system at all.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  Let me tell the hon. Lady that I could not care less about what any other political party has to say about these matters. I do not care what other politicians are saying on the television. I do not care what other activists are saying either. I care about the fact that I have an important job to do, and I can see that there is a problem here that needs to be fixed. If there was not a problem, I would not be pretending there was one. There is a genuine problem in the asylum system and we need someone to sort it out, not to pretend that it does not exist, which I am afraid is one of the things that fuels division in the first place. Since I have been Home Secretary, my own constituents have been telling me directly of abuses in the visa system that they can see with their own eyes, long before any officials in Whitehall have ever clocked on to those things. When we see something broken, we have a moral responsibility to fix it and to make sure that the fact that it is broken is not fuelling division in our country. Let me also say to the hon. Lady that it is Green party politicians who are absolute hypocrites, because they talk great language in here and then oppose asylum accommodation in their own constituencies.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  We are closing that loophole through the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, and it is important that colleagues support us when that is debated again on Wednesday. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that closing loopholes and ensuring that everyone is subject to a right-to-work check, thereby building support for a rule-of-law approach to the way that people access employment in this country, is incredibly important. I hope that all colleagues, even Opposition Members, will support those measures later this week.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  What I would say to the hon. Gentleman is what I said in response to a question from another Liberal Democrat earlier today. It would be a pull factor, because we know that the ability to work in this country illegally is already a pull factor, which is why we are clamping down on illegal working—we have seen 11,000 raids, 8,000 arrests and the removal of 1,000 people with no right to be in this country. Let me also say to the hon. Gentleman that I have had the misfortune of having to look through the TikTok accounts and the various other ways in which the organised immigration criminals advertise their packages for people to get on to a boat in the channel in the north of France, and it is in all those marketing materials as well. We also know from the intelligence that we gather that that is one of the pull factors, and we have to deal with it.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  It is this Government who are exiting hotels. We will do so—it is a manifesto commitment —by the end of the Parliament, and I intend to bring that forward as much as possible. Let me say to the hon. Member that we will always fulfil our international obligations, but I make no apology for wanting to privilege safe and legal routes over illegal entry into the country.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker. I did not mean any discourtesy; I was merely reflecting the truth of words that are used to me.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I urge the hon. Member to look at the detail of the asylum policy statement, the whole point of which is to deal with the pull factors that we know are drawing people to get on a dangerous boat and cross the channel illegally. The upshot of the reforms will be to deal with those pull factors, and he will know that we have said in the asylum policy statement that a relatively small number—just under 10%—of those in asylum accommodation already have the right to work, and in future we will expect them, where they have the right to work, to work.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I can assure my hon. Friend that we are engaging in intense law enforcement work through the National Crime Agency, and we are working collaboratively with our partners in Europe, especially in France. There have already been 350 disruptions of organised immigration crime activity. We have confiscated numerous small boats ourselves, and we are also working with our European partners to do that. The sum total of all those efforts has been to prevent 20,000 illegal crossings across the channel already, and we will grow this work, because we know that it is an important part of how we deal with the problem of small boats.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  It is absolutely through safe and legal routes that we should seek to bring people into our country, not through the people-smuggling route that originates in the north of France and crosses the channel. I have made an explicit policy choice to disincentivise people from coming through that route; they are paying thousands of pounds to organised immigration criminals to do so. We will privilege those who come through our safe and legal routes. As we get order and control into the system we have inherited, those routes will become more generous over time. They will start modestly—the numbers will be in the low hundreds—but they will grow. We want them to grow, because we want people seeking sanctuary to be able to find safe harbour in this country. We are proud of that position as a Government, so those routes will grow over time. I hope that Members from across the House will support that, but we have to get order and control into our system first.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I do not think there was a question in there, Madam Deputy Speaker. As for the hon. Gentleman’s invitation to join his party—hardly any of whose Members appear to be present—let me say to him, “Over my dead body.”

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I can assure my hon. Friend that it will fall to me to ensure that the system we have is capable of implementing all these reforms. We will consult and legislate as quickly as possible, and it will be on me to ensure that the Home Office can handle the work that is coming its way. I assure him that getting the administration right is part of the picture, but getting these reforms passed and implemented across the country is the most important thing that we can do.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Fixing this broken system is a moral mission for me, because I do not believe that we can look the other way and pretend that it is just talking points from our political enemies that are driving division in our country. The broken system is what is driving division in our country. I am determined to put that right to make sure that we do not divide our country and that we retain public consent for having an asylum system.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  No. I do not think the hon. Member would expect me to comment on live negotiations with other countries, but those negotiations are ongoing. I hope we will have announcements to make soon.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  My hon. and learned Friend mentions compassion. The compassion of our reforms will be reflected in the safe and legal routes, through which we will accept refugees into our country under a community sponsorship model and resettle and integrate them successfully; that is what will bear the load of fulfilling our international obligations. I know that people across our country will be proud to do so because, as he rightly says, compassion is a fundamental value of all our people, along with fairness and contribution. Taken together, these reforms strike the right balance. The appeal system is completely shot to pieces at the moment. It is riven with backlogs and even increasing judicial sitting days will not make the difference. It is absolutely appropriate that we design a new appeal system that is independent and has early legal advice available right at the start, and it is proper for the Government to set the framework for the speed at which cases can be heard, including fast-tracking claims that have no chance of success or are from countries with low grant rates in the first place. My hon. and learned Friend knows that listing within the current system is a matter for the independent judiciary, and we would never seek to interfere with that. With a new appeal system, the Government will be able to set the framework for the speed at which cases are heard, as well as providing legal advice at the start so that we have one claim, one appeal and certainty at the end of the process.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I wish I had the privilege of walking around this country and not seeing the division that the issue of migration and the asylum system is creating across this country. Unlike the hon. Gentleman, unfortunately, I am the one who is regularly called a “fucking Paki” and told to “Go back home”. I know through personal experience and through the experience of my constituents just how divisive the issue of asylum has become in our country. I wish it were possible to say that there is not a problem here—that there is nothing to see and that in fact these are all extremist right-wing talking points—but the system is broken. It is incumbent on all Members of Parliament to acknowledge how badly broken the system is and to make it a moral mission to fix this system so that it stops creating the division we all see. I do not think it is acceptable or appropriate for people in this place not to acknowledge the real experience of those who sit outside this House. We are supposed to be in this House to reflect that experience, and I hope the hon. Gentleman will approach the debates that we will no doubt have on all these measures in that spirit. The hon. Gentleman accused this Government of being too slow to act. I have to say that removals of those who have no right to be in our country are up by 23% in the first 18 months of this Labour Government compared with the last 18 months of the former Tory Government. We are a Government who are getting on with the job. We have made 11,000 enforcement raids, 8,000 arrests and, as a result of those raids, more than 1,000 people with no right to be in this country have been removed from this country. This is a Government who are getting on with the job, and this is just the next phase of our work as we deal with the broken migration system we inherited from the Conservatives. The hon. Gentleman said he thought that people who are waiting on their claim should be given the right to work. I think he knows that would be a huge pull factor and increase rather than decrease the number of channel crossings. That would be our experience in this country, and that is why we are not pursuing that policy. We have said that those who are granted refugee status in this country who can and want to will be able to switch into the protection work and study route, so that they can start contributing to society. That will help them to integrate, and it will help the communities they are living in. The hon. Gentleman knows full well that it is not the policy of this Government to confiscate jewellery from those who are accessing asylum accommodation. Asylum accommodation is provided to asylum seekers by British taxpayers, and it is right that if people have high-value assets, they contribute to the cost of that asylum accommodation. In my speech, I gave the example of a man who was in supported asylum accommodation, paid for by taxpayers in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and mine. He received £800 a month from his family and had enough money to acquire an Audi. It is right that the British state should be able to say to such an individual, “Contribute.” We are not saying that we will take everything away and leave that individual destitute, but contribution is a fair principle here. I would be very disappointed to discover that the Liberal Democrats do not support people contributing, when they can afford to, to the cost of their asylum accommodation. The hon. Gentleman made his remarks on Brexit. I do not have any more to say about that; I am living in the world as it is today. If he has things to say about that, I am sure that the House will continue to hear them.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I encourage my hon. Friend to look at the detail of the asylum policy statement on our intentions for the protection “work and study” route, which in future will be the route by which refugees can contribute and earn their way to settlement in this country. Of course, it is the express intention of this policy statement to disincentivise people coming on dangerous channel crossings, and to incentivise and to push people towards what will, over time, become more generous, safe and legal routes of entry into this country, with more privileged status when it comes to earning permanent settlement. Let me say to my hon. Friend on failed asylum-seeking families, because I think that important context was missing from her question, that there are 700 Albanian families at the moment who have made asylum claims and whose asylum claims have failed. The only reason they have not been removed from the country is the policies on not removing families—that is, parents with their children. We are not going to separate parents and their children, but we are going to consult on the removal of support and how we effectively and safely ensure that those individuals are returned. However, we will of course want to see most of those people return voluntarily instead.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  We are moving to a system of age verification, based on artificial intelligence modelling, which we believe is effective in verifying someone’s true age. Let me assure my hon. Friend that we will move to consult and legislate on these measures as quickly as possible. I am seized of the need to move quickly to restore public confidence. As we get order and control into the system, we will start opening up the safe and legal routes. They will be modest to begin with, but they will grow and be more generous over time, as we restore order and control.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I understand the point that my hon. Friend is making. The reality is that there are a lot of failed asylum seekers within the asylum accommodation system, and I am sure she would accept and agree that where somebody has a failed claim and no right to be in this country, the best thing to do is to voluntarily leave the country. We already provide packages to help people make that decision. I do not want to see people homeless in this country, but I know she cannot possibly think that the answer to that is essentially for there to be no consequence of a failed asylum claim. We need to run a system where the rules are enforced, as uncomfortable as that might occasionally be. We recognise that we do not want people in destitution; that is why we make financial packages available for people to voluntarily leave the country, and that will always be the case.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  I urge my hon. Friend to look at the proposals on protection work and study and on safe and legal routes. It is right that we try to pivot to a more humane system that privileges those who come not via paying people smugglers a lot of money. On family reunification, British citizens at the moment have to meet thresholds and various qualifying tests before they can apply for family reunion. I think it is right that we bring the position in relation to refugees through the protection work and study route to the same level.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  Of course, I will always happily meet my hon. Friend. We made it clear in the asylum policy statement that these measures do not apply to unaccompanied children and other vulnerable groups. We will set out our specific policies in relation to vulnerable groups, including unaccompanied children, separately; these measures do not apply to them. She will know that the scheme for Ukrainians is a bespoke temporary scheme that was brought in by the Conservative party when it was in government and supported not just by our party, but across this House. I expect the rules of that scheme to apply in the normal way, but I will of course discuss with her the issues that she raises.

• 17 Nov 2025 · Asylum Policy · Hansard source

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  Let me assure the hon. Member that I am making changes that I will ensure will work. I make no apology for disincentivising routes into this country that basically make people smugglers very, very rich men and fuel other disgusting crimes across Europe and in this country. It is right that we reserve a privileged status for those who get into work and education, as refugees on core protection will be able to do, as well as those who come via safe and legal routes. That should be the proper way that people come into this country and it has better integration outcomes as well.