UK Borders Bill — The Border and Immigration Agency must ensure the welfare of children as part of its remit — rejected — 9 Oct 2007 at 19:35

The majority Not-Contents rejected an amendment^[1] to the UK Borders Bill. The amendment sought to ensure that the Border and Immigration Agency (now the UK Border Agency) took steps to safeguard the welfare of children. However, it was defeated.

In moving the amendment Baroness Hanham argued that:

• 'If the agency does not have responsibility for the welfare of the child, who on earth does? The children are within its control and within its remit. It may be that that throws it a little wider as far as responsibilities are concerned under the Children Act, but at the moment these children are outside all the areas that will keep them safe from harm and look after their welfare.'^[2]

However, the government thought that:

• 'We do not think it appropriate for the Border and Immigration Agency to have a duty which requires it to have regard to ensuring that children are growing up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care... we are very concerned that the breadth of the duty would invite challenges to our decisions on the basis that they do not promote a child's welfare. Experience shows that many of these challenges would be made simply as a means of frustrating the implementation of quite legitimate immigration control.'^[3]

The UK Borders Bill became law in 2007. Its main aims were to:^[4]

• Impose biometric identity documents on non-EU immigrants
• Automatically deport foreign nationals if they are imprisoned for more than one year or commit specific offences
• Give immigration officers powers to detain, search and seize assets of suspected illegal immigrants

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• [1] Baroness Hanham, House of Lords, 9 October 2007
• [2] Baroness Hanham, House of Lords, 9 October 2007
• [3] Lord Bassam of Brighton, House of Lords, 9 October 2007
• [4] Based on The Guardian's A-Z of legislation

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