Speeches by Prinsley.

“We spoke about the graduated driving licence scheme in a Westminster Hall debate and referred to the situation in Western Australia and Victoria. Does the hon. Member agree that the lessons we can learn from there have absolute relevance to the situation here?”

“I thank the hon. Member for Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber (Brendan O’Hara) for bringing forward this most important debate. This is a debate on an obligation to assess the risk of genocide. Who could disagree with that? There has been a terrible war in Gaza, and although there is a ceasefire, loss of life continues. …”

“We heard yesterday that sometimes there are families with several children. We understand that there is a necessity to reapply every two and a half years, and the fees every two and a half years are substantial. We heard of situations where the family could not afford to make the application for all of the children, an…”

“I think people will find that very reassuring. What did the equality impact assessment identify as specific impacts of the changes proposed for children?”

“I agree with that, but do you recognise that the scale of the fees is a problem for some of the families?”

“I believe there is currently a five-year private life route for children and young people who have spent most of their life in the UK. Are you proposing to retain that?”

“Thank you for coming this morning, Home Secretary. Why are high earners more useful citizens than people who are not high earners?”

“I quite understand that, but the demand for workers in this country is not always for high earners. We have large numbers of people, for instance, working in the care sector, who are not high earners but are nevertheless extremely useful members of society. We need to be able to attract people to come to work in those …”

“I absolutely get that. Some changes have already been put in place, and I understand that net migration may be falling to very low levels already. Do you anticipate that, say by the end of this year, we may be in a situation where we have more people leaving the country than arriving?”

“We heard yesterday from a number of expert witnesses who spoke to us about issues relating to children and young people. Some of it was pretty upsetting, frankly. The single phrase that I went home with was the idea that there was “state-sponsored unwantedness”, and a feeling that there were hundreds of thousands of ch…”

“If a child came to the UK aged 10 and their parents do not achieve settlement for 15 years, when would the child receive settled status?”

“Are you worried that there will be an impact on child poverty?”

“The hon. Member is giving a historical perspective, which I am sure we all appreciate. It seems that Mr Mandelson is a serial liar. Does the hon. Member agree that the Prime Minister said this morning that Mr Mandelson lied, lied and lied to him? Who in this House has never been lied to?”

“Fish and chips is a great British food, but fish and chips first came to Britain with Jewish immigrants from Spain in the 16th century. Cold fried fish was a staple of many Shabbat lunches, including my own grandma’s. The first chippy is credited to Joseph Malin, who added chips in about 1860, in London. What a great i…”

“I agree with you.”

“Underlying this idea of extending the long routes to settlement is the idea that this will act as a significant disincentive for families to turn up here with children. Do you believe that to be the case?”

“You cannot retire.”

“The general public in this country are not aware of that. They would be simply horrified to learn that.”

“I am hearing that an untold number of children are completely unprotected.”

“Thank you very much. I am Peter Prinsley. I am the MP for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket. Thanks for coming today. Am I correct in assuming that large numbers of children have no citizenship, then? They have come here with parents who are not citizens and they may have been born here. What is your estimate of the numbe…”