Calais: Child Refugees

Baroness Watkins of Tavistock Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Baroness is absolutely right. Local authorities need to be reimbursed and there is a scheme for reimbursing local authorities that take the children. We do not want payment to be a disincentive for them. Again, I pay tribute to the local authorities that are taking the children.

[Baroness Watkins of Tavistock (CB)]

My Lords, will the Minister please assure us that there will be properly funded long-term mental health support for the children who are coming here? We know that in the longer term, investment in mental health support will make them much more successful citizens of this country, which is what we need the people we are bringing here to be able to achieve.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Baroness is absolutely right. These children will need access to not just mental health services but a range of protections and services that would be available to any child in local authority institutional care in this country. So I absolutely agree with her.