Speeches by Mahmood.

“It is my understanding that even on 15 October, in an email exchange, it was still believed that all options were on the table. I think my officials were trying to get information all the way through about what was going on. The possibility was raised on 8 October, and there is the email exchange about all options—”

“A change in the French doctrine on maritime tactics is a matter for the French authorities and their own legal system. It would be inappropriate for me to seek to direct how that is applied. I obviously want to see tactics that are safe, but which prevent people from getting on the boats. The fact that we saw the switc…”

“I am not, as you will know, able to see the papers of the previous Government, so, being in the building now, it is difficult for me to see exactly what was happening under the previous Administration. I would say that the publicly available numbers showed a big increase. As a constituency Member of Parliament, I was s…”

“We have already announced that we want to go from a baseline five-year qualifying period to 10 years, which we are not consulting on. We have a relatively generous welfare state. Five years is actually quite a short period before people can be permanently settled in the country, with all the benefits that brings. It is…”

“It is inconceivable that they wouldn’t have been aware at all. Obviously, it would be for them to explain what exactly they knew and when, but even if you just go by the information that was publicly available, in which you could see the big growths in net migration, I think it became very clear very quickly that there…”

“As late as 15 October, it was still said to Home Office officials that all options were on the table.”

“I would dispute that net migration is at very low levels. It is still really quite high. It has had a big drop from the very large increases that you saw under the previous Administration, but it is still comfortably over 200,000, which is still quite high on any measure. When I first came into Parliament, back in the …”

“I am sure that my officials are watching and will be able to respond. But evidence on this exact point has been given before to your Committee by the director general who was responsible for this.”

“Well, we are talking about a system of economic migration, so I think it would be odd to say that we are not looking at earnings. You are looking for people to come and work, and the intention is that they can support themselves. You are not looking to bring in people who will ultimately require assistance from the wel…”

“We managed to do a deal, and we have got flights off—flights have been coming in and going out. That takes big political will and effort, and we do appreciate it.”

“The consultation asks a very open question about whether the way to manage this part of the problem is to change what is available to you once you get settled status, versus just extending the qualifying period. There are pros and cons to both. On that particular question, the consultation is, and I am personally, very…”

“Evidence has already been given to the Committee about what was said in front of me on 8 October—”

“The reforms for settlement are precipitated by the issues in relation to the scale and pace of recent migration into the country. Between 2021 and 2024, net migration stood at 2.6 million people, which means that around one in every 30 people in this country today arrived in those four years. We have seen particular is…”

“But what I would say, with respect, is that you cannot go from nothing at all to massive numbers overnight, and we were trying to prove the concept that you could physically get done and meet the legal—”

“I would not say it is deterrence. There is a particular issue where we have seen migration into the country on a very large scale—much more than was expected—and of a very different nature to what we have had before, both in terms of the skills range and the number of dependants. Something like 50% of the care work num…”

“No, I disagree. If you look at our paper on the new proposals for settlement, the intention is to restore the element of contribution at the heart of the system. I think that our country is full of very tolerant and generous people—we are very open—but I think there is a condition to that, which is about contribution. …”

“No—you shouldn’t take what I have said as a plan. I have said that the consultation is genuinely open on this point, and that we have already had representations making some of these points. We will look at the totality of the responses that we have received before we design the final policy.”

“The Rwandans knew that we were always intending to cancel that deal—”

“There has already been lots of digital transformation at the Home Office, with all the attendant traumas and difficulties that that usually entails, but I do not envisage that these changes are going to break the system, as it were. It will be my job to make sure that that is not what is happening. There are some chang…”

“Because they have to do their risk assessment. This is why I have asked Andy Cooke to look at the whole of the process for coming to these decisions in the first place. There was a deep desire not to interfere with the operational independence of the police as they were making their risk assessment and deciding whether…”