Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)

I declare an interest as chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, but I am speaking in a personal capacity today. The Minister has given a spirited defence of all the international actions that the Government are taking to try to battle this pernicious trade. Closer to home, in terms of our internal domestic actions, he has been remarkably silent on President Macron’s exhortation to our Government to do more in domestic law to challenge what happens here, not least our very lax labour standards in the large grey market, which is the pull factor that brings so many people to come here in such treacherous journeys. Will the Government contemplate looking at two things proposed by Sir Trevor Phillips, a member of the Minister’s own party? One is digital ID cards, also proposed by former Prime Minister Tony Blair, and rolling them out. The objections of 2006—I remember them well—are no longer as palpable as they were then on the part of the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives because you can design the system very differently with technology now. The second thing would be to tax remittances because the whole point of someone coming and trying to work here is so that they can improve things at home. Remittances have apparently gone up from £6 billion to £9 billion, so that would be a lucrative way of filling the black hole. I wonder whether the Minister would comment on those things.