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There will be a new duty on landlords to ensure tenants are here legally – effectively contracting-out immigration control to private individuals and paving the way for racial discrimination – and plans to withdraw access to key public services, such as healthcare, for migrants. The Queen’s Speech hinted at reforms on the application of Article 8 of the Human Rights Act, the right to a private and family life, in deportation cases. It is rumoured that the legislation will remove consideration of a potential deportee’s family circumstances, connection to the UK or details of an offence. It is grossly unfair to blame difficulties with deportation solely on human rights laws – such decisions were complex long before the introduction of the HRA. There is also already a strong presumption in favour of deportation on the statute book. It is difficult to see what more can be done to talk tough about foreign nationals’ criminality – so now the Home Office seeks to strip innocent families of their human rights altogether.

Paul Houston, whose daughter was killed in a hit and run incident which became a cause-celebre for those wanting to scrap the human rights of foreign nationals, remarked:

“I’m tired of the Borders Agency blaming its failings on human rights instead of just doing its job. Getting landlords to check the status of tenants will lead to suspicion that anyone who isn’t white or who has a foreign-sounding name must be here illegally.”

New antisocial behaviour legislation will replace the huge number of civil orders and powers – such as ASBOs – introduced under Labour. Positive obligations, rather than just requirements to avoid a particular area or refrain from behaving antisocially, will be attached to the new orders, which will be much easier to obtain. Worse still, in the already published Draft Bill, a tough new mandatory eviction power is also included. Courts will be obliged to evict social tenants – including entire families – in certain circumstances, such as a breach of one of the new-look ASBOs. This will lead to innocent people being punished for a loved one’s bad behaviour. Such innocents will have committed no anti-social behaviour themselves – and those living in privately-owned houses will obviously not face such double punishment

More encouragingly, whilst the devil will be in the detail, the “Snoopers’ Charter” against which Liberty has campaigned fiercely, appears to be all but dead. The Bill would have seen the mass storage and collection of information about the online habits of the entire country, with details of every text, email and call made – and the address of every website visited – stored for future possible access by the Government. Following consistent attacks from civil liberty groups including Liberty, business, influential parliamentary committees and technology experts, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg vetoed the plan.

Shami Chakrabarti, Director of Liberty, said: “The best thing about this Queen’s Speech is what is missing from it – the worst aspects of the Snoopers’ Charter appear to be gone at least for this Parliament.

“However, a nasty taste comes from unfair double punishment of the vulnerable – as the children of social tenants face eviction for their relatives’ behaviour and those of foreign nationals face the break-up of their family through no fault of their own.”

Contact: Liberty Press Office on 020 7378 3656 or 07973 831128

NOTES TO EDITORS:

1. Paul Houston’s daughter Amy, 12, was run over and killed by a foreign national who left her trapped under the wheels of his car and ran off. The driver was prosecuted for failing to stop following an accident, driving whilst disqualified and driving without insurance. He had been disqualified from driving twice before he killed Amy. He was sentenced to just 4 months. Understandably Amy’s family were outraged at the sentence. After his release he went on to reoffend, driving without insurance and a license again, as well as a number of other offences. The Home Office could have issued a deportation order against him but they failed to do this, instead simply trying to remove him on the basis that he should leave and reapply for entry to the UK from abroad, using the correct channels. By the time they got around to trying to remove him, the driver said that he was married with two children. The judge decided that, because all the Home Office was trying to do was remove him so that he could reapply for entry from abroad, it would be disproportionate and in breach of Article 8, the right to a private and family life, to require him to do this. If the Home Office had tried to deport him, the driver’s repeat offending and his criminality would have been at the heart of the immigration case against him and would have been much more likely to succeed, outweighing his Article 8 arguments. Three Court of Appeal judges made this very clear – the fault was with the Home Office for not seeking his deportation; not the Human Rights Act.

2. A Draft Antisocial Behaviour Bill relating to today’s proposed ASBO changes was published last year. You can read Liberty’s response to that Draft Bill here: http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/pdfs/policy13/liberty-s-briefing-on-the-draft-anti-social-behaviour-bill-feb-2013-.pdf

3. In 2011 the Home Office consulted upon Article 8 of the HRA in the deportation context, before bringing forward secondary legislation last year. Read Liberty’s response to that consultation here: http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/pdfs/policy11/liberty-s-response-to-the-home-office-s-family-migration-consultation-oct-11.pdf

4. The new Immigration Bill will try to put on a statutory footing the changes made to the immigration rules around deportation of those convicted of criminal offences. Where the new “criminality thresholds” apply, the proposed legislation will require no consideration of an applicant’s circumstances, their connection to the UK or the details of their offence. It is unfair and inaccurate to attribute barriers to deportation solely to the Human Rights Act. Decisions to deport are complex and multi-faceted:

- The Immigration Act of 1971 provides for deportation to take place where conducive to the public good;

- The very considerations taken into account by judges under Article 8 were influential in decision making long before the Human Rights Act came into existence. They are the kind of considerations which fairness, decency and common sense demand be taken into account before an individual is removed from this country;

- Notwithstanding the protections enshrined in the Human Rights Act, the Immigration Rules were amended in 2006 to introduce a presumption that where an individual is convicted of a criminal defence, he should face deportation;

- Further, in legislation introduced in 2007 this presumption was placed on a statutory footing. It is the law of this country that, where an adult non-EU foreign national is sentenced to imprisonment of 12 months or more for a wide range of offences, there is a presumption that his deportation is conducive to the public good and the Home Secretary must make a deportation order, unless the decision to deport would be unlawful, or would represent a disproportionate interference with family life;

- Further, any person of 17 years or over who does not have the right of abode and who is convicted of an offence for which he is liable to a custodial sentence may be recommended for deportation by a the criminal court which has the power to sentence him; 

- Failures to remove foreign national offenders from the UK are frequently as a result of Home Office delay and incompetence which it then seeks to mask by blaming the Human Rights Act.