Asylum Seekers: Removal to Rwanda Debate

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Department: Home Office

Asylum Seekers: Removal to Rwanda

Jim Shannon Excerpts
Monday 13th June 2022

(1 year, 10 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.

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Tom Pursglove Portrait Tom Pursglove
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I hope that I can reassure my hon. Friend by saying that we are determined to deliver this policy. I know full well that if we do not get on and deliver it, he will be very much on my back, which is not something that I particularly want to happen. We will strain every sinew to deliver this. It is what the British people have elected us to do and what they expect us to deliver, and we are going to get on and do it.

Jim Shannon Portrait Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
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I congratulate the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) on securing this urgent question. A lot of media attention has focused on the human rights record of Rwanda and the threat that being sent to Rwanda poses to certain communities. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief, may I ask the Minister what assessment has been made of the threat facing those from religious or belief minority communities? What guarantees, if any, can be given as to the protection of religion or belief for all in Rwanda?

Tom Pursglove Portrait Tom Pursglove
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I refer the hon. Gentleman to the country information available out there. That is a comprehensive assessment of the situation, and it touches on these very issues. That work, I understand, is reputable and highly regarded in the judicial sphere as an accurate assessment of in-country situations. I certainly encourage him to have a look at it.