Ukraine Update

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I will protect the Secretary of State from the temptation to stray outwith his own territory.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

I, too, give my thanks to the Defence Secretary for his work and that of his team and for his compassion. I am afraid that I am going to raise another visa issue with him. My constituent is trying to get his young niece to the UK after she fled her home in Ukraine. After endless bureaucratic checks and delays, they have been told today that she has to travel nearly 300 km across Poland to get the decision on her visa. The Defence Secretary will understand that refugees such as my constituent’s niece have already made long and challenging journeys from Ukraine to Poland and now have to make more journeys just to get the decision. My constituent calls the Government’s approach to people fleeing the war in Ukraine “inhumane”. Given the meeting on the visa process that the Secretary of State mentioned, can he press on the Home Secretary the need to offer a compassionate and human response to refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine?

[Mr Wallace]

I do not want to run the risk of making you angry, Madam Deputy Speaker, so I will say that I would be delighted to pass that case to my Parliamentary Private Secretary and press the Home Office to resolve it. If I indulge myself here, Madam Deputy Speaker will rule me out of order, because this is a question about the Ukraine situation through Defence.