Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria his Department used to assess the availability of spaces in local authority care for unaccompanied child refugees.

In 2016, the Government conducted a comprehensive consultation with local authorities across the UK to assess their capacity to accept unaccompanied children into their care. The outcome of the consultation led to the Government announcing that it would transfer 480 unaccompanied children to the UK from Europe under section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.

The Home Office maintains a continual dialogue with local authorities and Strategic Migration Partnerships across the country in order to identify placements for unaccompanied children to fulfil the Government’s commitments.