Lord Craig of Radley (CB)

My Lords, in moving Amendment 56, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Harlech, for adding his name in support of it. I also thank the Royal British Legion for its guidance in drafting this amendment. Amendment 56 proposes amending the nationality fees regulations of 2018 to waive fees for certain Armed Forces veterans who have been granted indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom. Noble Lords may be interested to learn that the terms of my amendment featured in all three major party manifestos for the 2024 election. Let me quote them briefly. Labour said: “We will … scrap visa fees for non-UK veterans who have served for four or more years, and their dependents”. The Conservatives said: “We will extend the visa fees waiver introduced to cover Commonwealth personnel, to include their direct dependants”. The Liberal Democrats said that they would: “Secure a fair deal for the armed forces community … by … Waiving application fees for indefinite leave for members of the armed forces on discharge, and their families”. Nothing has happened since except that, in response to follow-up Written Questions last year, a Home Office Minister said this on 13 March: “We continue to keep this policy under review in the context of our wider considerations of various aspects of the immigration system”. The Ministry of Defence responded a week later, saying that it was “actively working with the Home Office to take this forward”. In short, prevarications apart, nothing has happened. To have a reply saying: “We continue to keep this policy under review in … our wider considerations of various aspects of the immigration system” is surely classic Sir Humphrey-speak. The Home Office should be ashamed of itself. The immigration system must be under constant study, not a one-off difficulty. What wider considerations are implied? The Government have recently been priding themselves on their reduction in illegal arrivals of over 40% and an increase in repatriations. There seems to be no crisis or wider aspect so great that the Government cannot immediately introduce this universally manifesto-promised arrangement. Families of service personnel who have qualified for indefinite leave to remain are faced with visa fees that were £155 in 2003 but have risen to no less than £3,226 per person as of 8 April—a staggering increase. So a spouse, their partner and two children applying for ILR now have to find almost £13,000, on top of their fares and relocation costs, to move to the UK. This is no way to treat veterans and their families. Such prevarication and inertia does not seem to be even related to the present Government. For more than 10 years, I and others pressed the Home Office to grant ILR to members of the Armed Forces who had been recruited and served in Hong Kong. All were members of the Hong Kong Military Service Corps. Repeated Home Office answers were varied ways of saying, “It is under active consideration”, or, “A decision will be made as soon as possible”. I once christened this Home Office foot-dragging as repetitive inactivity syndrome. The Hong Kong Military Service Corps veterans had to wait over a decade for their approval. Of course the Home Office faces pressures over immigration arrangements, but it flies in the face of the Government’s commitment to the Armed Forces covenant and to treating veterans fairly to have not yet honoured their manifesto pledge. It has cross-party support. Will the Minister take this back and quickly resolve it with the Home Office? I beg to move.