Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the average amount of time it takes for an applicant to the Ukraine Family Scheme to get an appointment for a biometric test in (a) Poland, (b) Romania and (c) Moldova.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Home Office does not capture the average wait times for appointments for individual Visa Application Centres. To capture numbers would require a manual trawl of data and to do so would incur disproportionate cost.
As part of the Home Office’s commitment to make it easier for applicants to apply to our schemes, since 15 March Ukrainians with valid passports no longer need to go to a Visa Application Centre to give their biometrics before they come to the UK.
Asked by: Baroness Fraser of Craigmaddie (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what support they are giving to Ukrainian refugees who have a disability; and how they are assisting the organisations in neighbouring countries which are supporting them.
Answered by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
There are 2.7 million people with disabilities in Ukraine that are at high risk of harm and abandonment. Many are trapped, unable to evacuate and experiencing severe food and medication shortages.
The UK has committed £394 million in humanitarian aid to the Ukraine crisis, including £220 million of humanitarian assistance which will be used to save lives, protect vulnerable people inside Ukraine and in neighbouring countries. UK humanitarian experts have deployed to Poland, Moldova and Romania to provide logistics, advice and analysis of the refugee situation, and a medical assessment team to Romania and Moldova to assess options for rapidly deploying UK Emergency Medical Team (UKEMT) capabilities.
Asked by: Stephen Kinnock (Labour - Aberavon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many additional staff with relevant expertise and experience have been allocated to the UK's visa application centre in Romania since 20 February 2022.
Answered by Kevin Foster
We are committed to ensuring our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective system. We actively monitor workflows to ensure sufficient resources are in place to meet demand, including from pressures relating to Ukraine.
The Home Office and the commercial provider operating our Visa Application Centres have surged staff across Europe to meet demand, where we can offer over 13,000 appointments to visa applicants, and UKVI staff in the UK are working seven days a week to process applications.
Asked by: Sarah Champion (Labour - Rotherham)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to help ensure that the humanitarian crises in and around Ukraine receives adequate (a) support and (b) funding, whilst ensuring that other humanitarian crises including those in Afghanistan and Yemen, do not lose the support and funding they require.
Answered by James Cleverly - Home Secretary
The UK is one of the leading humanitarian donors to Ukraine, pledging almost £400 million in aid, including £220 million of humanitarian assistance. These funds will be used to save lives, protect vulnerable people inside the country and in the wider region. In addition to funding, the UK has deployed a field team of 13 humanitarian experts to Poland, Moldova and Romania to provide logistics advice and analyse the evolving refugee situation.
The UK remains committed to the pledges it has made in response to other humanitarian crises, including Yemen and Afghanistan. In Yemen, the total amount of UK funding since the conflict began is approximately £970 million. In Afghanistan, the UK will have disbursed approximately £286 million in aid, by the end of this financial year.
Asked by: Yvette Cooper (Labour - Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what is the average waiting time for appointments at visa application centres for those applying under the Ukraine Family Scheme.
Answered by Kevin Foster
We are committed to ensuring our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective system. We actively monitor workflows to ensure sufficient resources are in place to meet demand, including from pressures relating to Ukraine.
The Home Office has surged capacity to European countries including Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Moldova, Poland and Romania. This work has increased the total capacity of UKVI of over 13,000 appointments being available for visa applicants across the region.
As part of the Home Office’s commitment to make it easier for applicants to apply to our schemes, since 15 March Ukrainians with passports no longer need to go to a Visa Application Centre to give their biometrics before they come to the UK.
Asked by: Yvette Cooper (Labour - Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many additional caseworkers has her Department assigned to process applications to the Ukraine Family Scheme since its introduction.
Answered by Kevin Foster
We are committed to ensuring our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective system. We actively monitor workflows to ensure sufficient resources are in place to meet demand.
We have UKVI staff in the UK who are working seven days a week to process the Ukraine Family Scheme applications.
The Home Office has also surged capacity to European countries including Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Moldova, Poland and Romania. This work has increased the total capacity of UKVI across the region with over 13,000 appointments being available for visa applicants.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking with her international counterparts in countries bordering Ukraine to support (a) identification and (b) transportation to the UK of eligible refugees.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The UK Government is engaged in dialogue with a range of international partners to ensure our response to the situation in Ukraine is coordinated and effective. The Home Secretary is speaking regularly to her international counterparts, including countries bordering Ukraine, to understand how the UK can work together with our partners.
The Home Office has made the visa process quicker and simpler for Ukrainians to come here. Valid passport holders no longer have to attend in-person appointments to submit fingerprints or facial verification. This means Visa Application Centres across Europe can focus their efforts on helping Ukrainians without documentation. The Home Office is deploying more staff to the region to support customer queries and bring on board further capacity to facilitate more biometric appointments. This is in addition to actions we have already taken including surging capacity to countries neighbouring Ukraine including Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czech Republic and Moldova, including a new pop-up VAC in Rzeszow, Poland. We have already increased the capacity to support customer queries and to expand capacity across our Visa Application Centres to 13,000 appointments per week in Europe.
A number of European transport companies are offering free transport for people fleeing Ukraine. This includes rail, bus, ferry and air travel. The transport industry in England, Scotland and Wales has also come together to offer free rail, tram, bus and coach onward travel for Ukrainians arriving in the UK from any international port, airport or train station.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she plans to take to speed up the transit of the Ukrainian people to the UK in the context of the humanitarian crisis in Poland and neighbouring countries along the Ukrainian border.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Immigration issues cannot be tackled by one country alone; it takes an international effort. The UK Government is therefore engaged in dialogue with a range of international partners to ensure solutions to migration issues are practical and in the best interest of the Ukrainian people. The Home Secretary is speaking regularly to her international counterparts, including in countries bordering Ukraine, to understand how the UK can work together with our partners.
The Home Office has launched the Ukraine Family Scheme and the Homes for Ukraine Scheme to support Ukrainians who wish to come to the UK. We have also made the visa process quicker and simpler for Ukrainians to come here. Valid passport holders no longer have to attend in-person appointments to submit fingerprints or facial verification. This means Visa Application Centres across Europe can focus their efforts on helping Ukrainians without documentation. We have also surged capacity to countries neighbouring Ukraine including Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czech Republic and Moldova, including a new pop-up VAC in Rzeszow, Poland.
The UK is committed to supporting the growing humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and the forced displacement of people. The UK is providing £220 million of humanitarian assistance for Ukraine, which takes the UK total support to the Ukraine crisis to almost £400 million overall. We have also deployed UK humanitarian experts to support Ukraine’s neighbours, who are receiving and supporting refugees fleeing Ukraine, through providing logistics advice and analysis of needs on the ground.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will take steps to co-operate with European countries to ensure that no refugee from the Ukrainian crisis is denied access to the UK.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Immigration issues cannot be tackled by one country alone; it takes an international effort. The UK Government is therefore engaged in dialogue with a range of international partners to ensure solutions to migration issues are practical and in the best interest of the Ukrainian people. The Home Secretary is speaking regularly to her international counterparts, including in countries bordering Ukraine, to understand how the UK can work together with our partners.
The Home Office has launched the Ukraine Family Scheme and the Homes for Ukraine Scheme to support Ukrainians who wish to come to the UK. We have also made the visa process quicker and simpler for Ukrainians to come here. Valid passport holders no longer have to attend in-person appointments to submit fingerprints or facial verification. This means Visa Application Centres across Europe can focus their efforts on helping Ukrainians without documentation. We have also surged capacity to countries neighbouring Ukraine including Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czech Republic and Moldova, including a new pop-up VAC in Rzeszow, Poland.
The UK is committed to supporting the growing humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and the forced displacement of people. The UK is providing £220 million of humanitarian assistance for Ukraine, which takes the UK total support to the Ukraine crisis to almost £400 million overall. We have also deployed UK humanitarian experts to support Ukraine’s neighbours, who are receiving and supporting refugees fleeing Ukraine, through providing logistics advice and analysis of needs on the ground.
Asked by: Mark Hendrick (Labour (Co-op) - Preston)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many staff in her Department are assigned to visa application centres in (a) France, (b) Poland, (c) Hungary, (d) Moldova, (e) Romania and (f) other overseas centres as of 10 March 2022; and if she will provide a breakdown of the number of staff assigned to each of those countries.
Answered by Kevin Foster
We are committed to ensuring our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective system, and we actively monitor workflows to ensure sufficient resources are in place to meet demand, including from pressures relating to Ukraine.
The Home Office and the commercial provider operating our Visa Application Centres have surged staff across Europe to meet demand, where we can offer over 13,000 appointments to visa applicants. We review demand in individual locations regularly and flex resources to meet it as needed.