Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean and Europe

Debate between Angela Crawley and Hywel Williams

Wednesday 9th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Hywel Williams]

I thank the Minister for that intervention and look forward to his response to my other questions about the VPR scheme. On Monday I asked the Prime Minister a question about that scheme, and said that at the request of many organisations and my constituents I had written to the Immigration Minister in July about the matter. In his reply the Minister referred to the VPR scheme, stating clearly that it

“was designed to focus on need rather than meeting a quota.”

I think that need is a good and humane yardstick. The need in the current circumstances is undoubtedly very large; indeed it is perhaps enormous. Applying need as a principle for action allows for a timely and measured response and for the use of discretion. However, the Prime Minister has announced that we will take 20,000 refugees. I am sure that those people will be in great need, but 20,000 seems to be a fixed number. On Monday I asked him what he will say to the 20,001st person who applies and who has a provable and legitimate need.

[Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP)]

A UNICEF report indicates that at least a quarter of those seeking refuge in Europe are children, and in the first six months of this year more than 106,000 children claimed asylum in Europe, up 75% on last year. The Prime Minister made assurances today during Prime Minister’s questions that Syrian children will not automatically be returned when they are 18. That is a welcome instruction, but we would like assurances because the issue will remain deeply concerning for children who come to this country unaccompanied. Can the Minister provide assurances that they will also be protected?

[Hywel Williams]

I will pose that question to the Minister and thank the hon. Lady—in fact, she is blessed with clairvoyance because I was going to ask that question myself.

I referred to a question that I asked the Prime Minister on Monday about the 20,001st person, and his response was disappointing. Indeed, it was either dismissive or even alarming. He said merely that we should concentrate on the 20,000—that is all he said, period. I am all for concentrating on the 20,000 to the extent of offering entry to as many genuine cases as possible as soon as possible, and not over the five years that the Government intend, but 20,000 looks to me like a quota. Hon. Members will recall what I said about my answer from the Immigration Minister and the VPR scheme being based on need and not a quota. By their very nature quotas inevitably lead to artificial and possibly brutal cut-offs, and pit one person’s genuine need against that of another as they both join the queue. I do not think that is a humane way of doing it.

The Prime Minister’s reply suggests to me either that he and his colleagues have not thought the matter through, or that they have done so and are reluctant to engage with the real consequences, which are not hard to imagine. For example, one can envisage a popular campaign in the press, perhaps in favour of admitting an injured child as No. 20,001. One can imagine a campaign in favour of admitting siblings or other relatives of people already admitted, or, as the hon. Member for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) said, at the end of five years and the current terms of the VRP scheme, a campaign not to send a young person who has thoroughly adopted a British identity back to a strife-ridden country. One can imagine the problems that will arise with that artificial cut-off. I was glad to hear that the Prime Minister is looking at this matter because it is serious and needs considering.

This is easy for me to say, but I would not have started from this point. As many hon. Members have said, one root cause of our current predicament is the Government’s reluctance to engage earlier with the UNHRC Syrian resettlement scheme, which led to the setting up of the VPR scheme in the first place. Therefore, there are some causes that we can discern, and there are ways forward.

Briefly, let me mention a couple of points from my own party’s policy on this matter. We wish to see a Welsh migration service set up to co-ordinate migration into Wales and Wales recognised as a country of refuge.

Finally, I have a question for the Minister on the response of the Welsh Government. I hope that I will not be seen as partisan in this matter. On Monday, the hon. Member for Dundee West (Chris Law) asked the Prime Minister about the response of the Scottish Government. The Prime Minister said that

“in the letter the First Minister of Scotland wrote to me, she said that Scotland would be willing to take 1,000 refugees.”—[Official Report, 7 September 2015; Vol. 599, c. 57.]

That is very praiseworthy indeed, and we have heard that that is a starting point and not an end point. When the Minister winds up, will he tell me—or perhaps put it in a letter—whether he has had a similar offer from the Welsh Government?