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Sarah Smith (Hyndburn) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered children and armed conflict.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer, and it is a privilege to bring this topic, which I know is an important one for many of my constituents, to Westminster Hall today.
I open the debate with an uncomfortable statistic: today one in five children across the world are growing up in conflict zones. I am sure we can all agree that that is not a statistic we should accept or ever ignore. From Gaza to Ukraine to Yemen, children are paying the highest price for conflicts they did nothing to create. Between 2020 and 2024, nearly 50,000 have become casualties of war—the equivalent of 200 full passenger planes. Those figures are just the tip of the iceberg of the true scale of violations, are limited to incidents it was possible to record and verify, something that can be extremely challenging in situations of active conflict and where access restrictions are in place. UNICEF reports that more than 100 children have been killed in Gaza alone since the ceasefire in early October 2025. That is an average of one child killed every day—and that during a ceasefire. Is the Minister considering children’s distinct needs and vulnerabilities, and their additional rights under international law, in the context of assessing Israel’s compliance with international human rights law?
The United Nations children and armed conflict agenda makes abundantly clear what has been documented: the very youngest victims of war are being caught in its merciless machinery. Children face indiscriminate harm, including killings, maiming, recruitment, abductions and attacks on schools and hospitals, at levels not previously seen and Gaza figures among the worst-affected contexts. Currently, the Occupied Palestinian Territory is the most dangerous place on earth to be a child, obtaining that title for the second year running, with grave violations committed at an extraordinary scale and pace by the Israeli forces. Most verified incidents were of the killing and maiming of children caused by the use of explosive weapons in populated areas. It must be noted that children are seven times more likely than adults to die from blast injuries. Concurrently, we are witnessing the destruction of spaces dedicated to children’s education, development and play. Armed conflict exacts its heaviest toll on children.
Helen Grant (Maidstone and Malling) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member on securing the debate. As she has just mentioned education, does she agree that education for children in very difficult settings can provide them with a lifeline and a place where they can feel safe, make friends and build up their self-confidence and self-esteem, while at the same time, giving them a sense of hope and aspiration for the future? For those reasons, does she agree that it is important that the Government continue to fund education in those settings and to fund education research into what works best in trying to help and educate our children in very difficult conflict zones?
Sarah Smith
The hon. Member raises an incredibly important point. Children absolutely deserve the right to continue to have even the tiniest opportunity for some form of normality—something that helps them to imagine a world beyond the conflict that they are currently living in. I look forward to hearing from the Minister how our Government are supporting children in conflict zones, including Gaza.
Children are not simply collateral damage. With schools, hospitals and residential neighbourhoods struck, children are not just incidental casualties; they are front and centre in the decimation of armed conflict. Their places of safety, education and play are being mercilessly destroyed. Those children are forced to grow up faced with the daily nightmares of armed conflict and the impact that it has on their homes.
More than 60% of child casualties in recent conflicts are due to explosive weapons. The Occupied Palestinian Territory, including Gaza, is among the deadliest places for children. We must remember these injuries cast a long shadow: a wounded child today becomes a young adult tomorrow, scarred physically, emotionally and psychologically. Many face a lifetime without adequate rehabilitation, prosthetics or even basic medical care because restricted humanitarian access and damage to hospitals make proper treatment nearly impossible.
Laura Kyrke-Smith (Aylesbury) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech on an important topic. She talks about the trauma of children living in war zones. According to UNICEF, 100% of children in Gaza face mental health challenges, and are in need of mental health and psychosocial support. Does she agree that that is a crucial part of protecting children during conflict and helping them to recover from it?
Sarah Smith
Absolutely. I recognise my hon. Friend’s expertise: she worked in this area prior to coming to this place. Unfortunately, that statistic is no surprise, given the situation that children face in Gaza.
This Parliament has repeatedly affirmed that human rights are universal, that the rights of the child are not suspended at borders or battle lines, and that international law must be upheld consistently and without double standards. The convention on the rights of the child obliges us to protect children from all forms of violence, including during armed conflict, yet in Gaza that obligation is being flouted with impunity. The United Nations continues to verify grave violations, and keeps parties that violate children’s rights on its monitoring list—a solemn reminder that we cannot look away. I ask the Minister whether the Government will push Israel to agree to and implement a UN action plan to reduce harm to children, and ensure it remains listed in the report until that has been fully achieved.
I commend the work of the Labour Government. The latest figures show that they have provided £241 million in official development assistance to the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including £154 million in humanitarian funding, between 2023 and 2025. That has enabled more than 500,000 medical consultations, food for about 647,000 people and sanitation for another 300,000. I pay genuine tribute to the important work that my hon. Friend the Minister does, and I thank him for his dedication to the region, both before coming to this place and since he has taken on these responsibilities. He has made huge diplomatic efforts since the horrific and unforgivable events of 7 October.
It is important to return to the United Nations children and armed conflict agenda. I know the Government champion it and have committed additional funding to support its mandate. Its yearly report identified the five most dangerous places to be a child in the world—the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, Haiti and Nigeria—and is an important tool, acting as a catalyst for behaviour change.
Tahir Ali (Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. Does she agree that children are often used as tools, and even child soldiers, in many areas of conflict? In Sudan, for example, the conflict between the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese armed forces has affected more than 10 million children, 200 of whom have been raped. Wherever possible, we must hold Governments to account, whether in India—where children are being deliberately targeted in Kashmir—Yemen, Sudan or Gaza. We cannot allow these situations, where children are the biggest sufferers, to go on. In my constituency, I see many young men from Afghanistan with mental health issues who are here seeking asylum or as refugees. We must give them the help that they deserve and need.
Graham Stringer (in the Chair)
Order. I remind Members that the time for this debate is tight, so interventions should be short and to the point.
Sarah Smith
Unfortunately, the official numbers no doubt do not represent the full situation yet it is devastating to hear what my hon. Friend says. His intervention also points to a broader challenge, although it is not part of this debate, about the need for the international or global human rights order at the current time, and the importance of organisations such as the International Criminal Court and the UN in upholding that order and campaigning on these critical issues.
What matters now is whether we act on what the research from the UN’s children and armed conflict agenda makes unmistakably clear. Childhoods are being destroyed and places of learning, safety and sanctuary are being decimated. We need to uphold international law and be a country that is promoting peace.
It is welcome that Gaza’s key Rafah border crossing is gradually being reopened. According to local hospitals and the World Health Organisation, about 20,000 sick and wounded Palestinians are waiting to leave Gaza for treatment. Can the Minister inform parliamentarians what discussions have taken place with the Israeli Government on the process for the evacuation of all severely sick children now that the Rafah crossing is beginning to open? Does that allow for humanitarian and medical specialists, UN agencies and civil society organisations to gain access to the Occupied Palestinian Territories to support the unobstructed monitoring and reporting of grave violations against children?
Several hon. Members rose—
Graham Stringer (in the Chair)
Order. I intend to call the Front-Bench spokespeople at 5.10 pm. That gives us just under 30 minutes, and seven Members are standing; I think three and a half minutes each would be appropriate, but please try to keep interventions brief. I remind Members to keep bobbing before I call somebody to speak.
Ayoub Khan (Birmingham Perry Barr) (Ind)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing this important debate.
There is no period of greater importance than childhood. Every child deserves dignity, protection and the support needed to give them the best possible start in life. Yet today, more than 500 million children are living in active conflict zones around the world. Every day, we are confronted with the human cost of war on children: the 20,000 Ukrainian children abducted and taken to Belarus and Russia, many of whom may never see their families again; the 10.8 million children in Yemen denied food, clean water, healthcare and education; and the millions of girls in Sudan facing displacement, starvation and the constant threat of abduction, exploitation and enslavement.
The scale of trauma being inflicted on children worldwide is both incomprehensible and intolerable. Ending this suffering requires two things from a Government such as ours—adequate humanitarian and development assistance to meet children’s immediate needs, and the political courage to prioritise human rights and the prevention of harm over political expediency. On both counts, unfortunately, this Government have failed, in my view. At a time when children’s suffering has never been more widespread, the Government chose to halve the overseas aid budget. That was not an unavoidable necessity, but a political choice, and one that has stripped millions of children of access to food, healthcare, education and protection. Now is not the time for retreat; it is a time for leadership. Instead, the Government have turned away from their responsibility to uphold the most basic human dignities.
However, this failure goes beyond aid. The Government have also failed to take the political action necessary to prevent and halt the conflicts that devastate children’s lives in the first place. Nowhere—nowhere—is that more evident than in Gaza. For over a year, this Labour Government stood by as Palestinian children were bombed, shot and starved, and as their schools, hospitals and homes were destroyed. Through their inaction, the Government have been complicit in the destruction of the conditions children need to live, learn and grow. They stood by as their lives were reduced to bare survival, or taken away altogether.
We cannot soften the reality of the physical, emotional and psychological trauma inflicted on these children. A recent study led by the University of Cambridge found that constant bombardment and starvation have left children in Gaza
“too weak to learn or play”,
and convinced that they will be “killed for being Gazans”. These children have lost not only their homes and health, but their hope and their faith that the international system will protect them.
Children in Gaza will have lost the equivalent of five years of education since 2020. Rebuilding education across Palestine is going to cost billions. As a result, children will depend on foreign aid for decades, not because this was inevitable, but because the Government failed to stand up for international law when it mattered most. We must be honest about our role in this devastation. The suffering did not occur in a vacuum, and our silence and inaction were not neutral. Lives were destroyed because it was politically convenient to look away.
Chris Evans (Caerphilly) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) on securing such an important debate. The effects of war on children are devastating, as often seen in the media, but we must look beyond what we see. We see humanitarian disasters; we do not see the recruitment of child soldiers beforehand, the mental trauma and the loss of education. What we do see we must take seriously, as it reflects a sad reality that many children live in. That should never be overlooked.
That is why the Government must invest in conflict prevention and peacebuilding strategies. We need to address the root causes that make children vulnerable, such as poverty and lack of support within the community. We need to lead the way in preventing humanitarian crises. The UK humanitarian framework is committed to doing that, but I ask the Minister whether the Government are introducing or considering any new strategies. We need to act early and take precautionary and preventive measures. There needs to be investment in the way that children can report grave violations, and the stigma associated with them must be addressed. I ask the Minister to liaise with other leaders in the UK and internationally on how that can be done. In developing these strategies, we must find a way to give children a voice to express what they need, for they are very often the silent victims. I therefore ask the Minister: how are the Government giving children a voice in a safe, supported way, and will they liaise with charities such as Save the Children, which has conducted a vast amount of research on this topic and how to improve this?
The UK, as a member of the UN Security Council, donated £450,000 to UNICEF’s monitoring and reporting mechanism in 2025. Do the Government intend to increase that donation, given that, in 2024, less than 2% of global security funds went towards peacebuilding and peacekeeping? That is a small sum compared with the weapons of war that are produced every day. The way to combat issues such as displacement, child soldier recruitment and denial of humanitarian aid is not to decrease spending on peacebuilding. Only recently, The Independent stated that nearly 23 million additional deaths are expected by 2030 as a result of cuts in overseas aid. Many of those will be children. They will be denied a future. What could they provide if they were allowed to live, and not live in these warzones? That is the tragedy of these cases.
There needs to be more long-term investment to minimise the life-changing effects on children living in armed conflict. Just because war ends, it does not mean that the effects do. Children are left with mental trauma, with a lack of support, infrastructure and community, and, tragically, a lost education. We need to use our leadership and diplomacy to find new ways to protect children. The grave violations against them are rising, and it is imperative that our framework keeps up with that. This is not a political question; it is a moral one, and we should not be found wanting.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for setting the scene incredibly well and for all the work she has done on the issue over the years and in her time in Parliament. She has championed the protection of children in armed conflict in the past and has done well to set the scene today.
We must confront a deeply troubling reality. Children are not only being drawn into armed conflict; they are increasingly becoming its direct victims. According to a 2023 United Nations report on the recruitment and use of child soldiers, tens of thousands of boys and girls worldwide, some as young as eight or nine, are recruited and exploited by armed forces and armed groups, with their roles ranging from combatants and cooks to spies and messengers and, most disturbingly, victims of sexual slavery. Of growing concern is the use of children to plant explosive devices, which reflects the brutal evolution of modern warfare. As conflict continues to escalate across the globe, we must ask ourselves, “What more can we do?” What more can the Government do to protect children from lives that no child should ever be forced to endure?
Chris Evans
The hon. Gentleman speaks from experience, himself knowing conflict, and he knows that Belfast is now a vibrant European city, with education on the rise. Can he give some advice on what can be done to address the matter of children who grew up in that conflict and how they have adapted to modern life?
Jim Shannon
I was talking to the Liberal Democrat Northern Ireland spokesperson, the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler), last night, and he asked me a similar question. We have the urban and the rural: in the urban areas—Belfast, Londonderry and the big cities—the influence on people is perhaps more direct and harder to get away from. If people are living in the smaller towns or villages, as I have, there is not the same direct influence. Government collectively are trying to work to ensure that we can deliver a better life. Some of that involves such things as Catholics and Protestants playing together, going to school together, and playing football and other games together. Lots of things are being done, but there is more to do, and we have to influence that. There is a role for churches to play as well. I thank the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Chris Evans) Gentleman for that intervention.
I draw the House’s attention to the particularly harrowing context of Nigeria. Boko Haram’s sustained campaign of violence, particularly against religious minorities, has devastated countless lives. Children have been forcibly recruited into armed groups, while many more have lost parents, families, access to education and even their own childhoods. Some girls have borne children while still children themselves, as a direct result of captivity and abuse.
In 2024, the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief, which I chair, and our secretariat, the Freedom of Religion or Belief Foundation, had the privilege of leading a parliamentary delegation to Nigeria, alongside other hon. Members and Julie Jones, the director of the foundation. We worked with the Gideon and Funmi Para-Mallam Peace Foundation, and met women and girls who had survived Boko Haram captivity. The Gideon and Funmi Para-Mallam Peace Foundation continues to work tirelessly to secure the release of those still held by the group, often at great personal risk.
One of those children is Leah Sharibu. I pray for that wee girl every day. Leah is now in her eighth year of captivity, having been the only student not released following the abduction of 110 Dapchi schoolchildren by Boko Haram on 19 February 2018.
Kirsteen Sullivan (Bathgate and Linlithgow) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the hon. Gentleman share my concern that kidnap is increasingly being used as a tool of war in areas of conflict, whether Ukraine, where thousands of children have been abducted and torn from their homes, or in Nigeria and Sudan? This is becoming more prevalent, and it is causing immense worry.
Jim Shannon
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. In Ukraine, some 30,000 children have been kidnapped and taken away from their parents—that cut-off between parents and children is devastating.
In Nigeria, young Leah has given birth to three children. Her freedom, and the freedom of many like her, remains unresolved. Too often, children affected by armed conflict are forgotten once the headlines fade, yet their suffering does not end when the world looks away.
I am therefore grateful that we can use our voices as Members of this House, in this debate and others, as well as on the global stage, to advocate for the protection of these children and to press for accountability, rehabilitation and long-term peace for them. I say honestly to the Minister and the Government that I am proud to support a Government who recognise that every child, wherever they are born, has the right to grow up in a safe, healthy and protective environment. We should be encouraged by a Government who state that.
Finally, to those children who, in the face of relentless adversity, continue to hope for a better future, I end with scripture. John 16:33 says:
“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
Patricia Ferguson (Glasgow West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing the debate. I know how interested she is in these issues, and how much she cares about them, so it is good that we are having this debate today.
I make no apologies for enumerating some figures that I think we would all do well to remember. As we have heard, for the second year running, the Occupied Palestinian Territory was the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. In 2024, Israeli armed forces were responsible for 7,188 grave violations against Palestinian children. That means that Israeli forces were responsible for more than one in five of the total number of verified grave violations committed globally in 2024. The verified number of Palestinian children killed and maimed by Israeli forces in 2024 was 3,867. Most instances were caused by the use of explosive weapons in populated areas. As of July 2025, over 40,500 children in Gaza were estimated to have been injured. The occupied Palestinian territory is now home, shamefully, to the largest cohort of child amputees in modern history.
As of July 2025, at least 21,000 children were living with permanent disabilities, which included traumatic brain injuries, burns, complex fractures and hearing loss. The Save the Children report, “Children and Blast Injuries”, explains that the reason for that is because children are uniquely vulnerable to blast injuries, as they are more likely to die as a result of attacks, or to suffer more severe physical harm, in comparison with adults. The situation is compounded by the rise of new weapons technologies such as cluster munitions, and the increase of conflict being conducted in cities, with bombs and drones often striking—in fact, targeting—schools, hospitals and homes. The report makes a number of calls on the Government, one being to publish what would be the first-ever cross-departmental children in conflict strategy. I hope the Minister will address that in his winding-up speech.
I was very pleased that the hon. Member for Maidstone and Malling (Helen Grant) mentioned education in conflict zones. It is an issue that the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown raised a number of years ago. He said that those living in conflict zones have the right to expect medical care, and that children in conflict zones should have the right to expect an education, in spite of what is going on around them, no matter how difficult that might be.
I am sure that we all have a view about the board of peace that has been created to look after Palestine and Gaza. I have many concerns about it, but I want to talk about one today: the fact that there is only one woman on the board of peace. I do not for one moment suggest that men do not care about children, but I think that women have a particular perspective. They are often the people who are now left to look after children with no support, often having lost their breadwinner. The Government could use any influence they have to advocate—
Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stringer. My thanks go to my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing this debate.
For me, the most depressing and terrifying departmental questions that we have in this place are Defence questions. We had a session on Monday this week, and it was no exception. There always seem to be questions from nearly every corner of the Chamber about increasing military spending: about more money for more bombs and more weapons—“Let’s make Britain a defensive industrial powerhouse.” Respectfully, if anyone thinks that the route to improving living standards for millions of people in this country is making drones, weapons and the like, I am confident that they are wrong.
When we watch the news and see what is happening in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan, Syria and other places across the globe, do we think that what the world needs right now is more killing, more death and more weapons? I do not. I categorically think that we need less. When I watch the news and see children in warzones, sitting in rubble, traumatised, starving and orphaned—the victims of the horrors of war—I feel overwhelming sadness.
But should we not also think about the weapons that have been used to create this appalling humanitarian situation? In Gaza specifically, we have seen parents carry the bodies of dead children. Doctors have come to Westminster to tell MPs about tending to children who have been shot in the head by Israeli drones. Millions of people have taken to the streets all across Britain to protest at the deaths of innocent civilians. Save the Children—not a fringe organisation—says that more than 20,000 children have been murdered. On average, one Palestinian child has been killed every hour by Israeli forces over nearly 23 months of war. More than 1,000 children killed were under the age of one, while at least 42,000 children have been injured and 21,000 have been left permanently disabled.
During so many urgent questions and statements in the main Chamber, Foreign Secretaries have said that arms sales are a complicated issue, but thousands of children being massacred is not complicated.
Tahir Ali
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government should cease all arms sales to Israel, given that the Israel Defence Forces general, Aharon Haliva, is on record as saying that 50 Palestinians must die for every death that happened on 7 October, and
“it does not matter…if they are children”?
Brian Leishman
I am in complete agreement. I have said that many times in Westminster Hall and the main Chamber, and in the media as well. My hon. Friend is absolutely correct: there is no justification for arms sales to Israel.
It is important to talk about that because, in the wider scheme of things, history will absolutely judge politicians in this place. Politicians will be judged on their complicity in this genocide by continuing those arms sales to Israel. Keeping global pools and supply chains stocked is no justification for killing children and other innocents.
A ceasefire in name only is no cause for celebration because the killing has continued. This week alone, Israeli airstrikes killed at least 32 Palestinians, including several children. We must get our heads around the truth because it is important. The truth is that the genocide has not stopped.
Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer, not least as a neighbouring colleague. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing this valuable debate.
In Gaza, aid workers and medical teams have become used to using the world’s most heartbreaking acronym: WCNSF—wounded child, no surviving family. The phrase was born in Gaza’s hospitals as overworked trauma surgeons had to deal with so many injured, unaccompanied children that they simply scrawled WCNSF on their files. As Kieran King, head of humanitarian at UK charity War Child, told us at a briefing in Parliament last month, Gaza is the first conflict where such a term has been needed because of the sheer number of wounded children.
The UN’s child protection agency UNICEF cited Gaza’s Health Ministry statistics from last September, recording that 2,596 Palestinian children had lost both parents and a further 53,000 had lost at least one parent, of whom 47,000 will grow up with no father and 5,920 will grow up with no mother. Those are not just ordinary statistics. Gaza has the highest rate of child amputations of any modern conflict. Those are all individual human beings whose stories need to be shared.
The powerful new film “The Voice of Hind Rajab”, which was screened for MPs in Parliament last month, bears witness to one of those stories as it follows the Red Crescent response during the killing of a six-year-old Palestinian girl by the IDF. Those of us who saw that film will never forget it.
I was proud that within days of the Gaza ceasefire, the Government, working with Labour MPs, brought over 50 children to the NHS to be treated for their complex injuries. But there is much, much more we can do to rebuild the healthcare, schools and social services that children desperately need in Palestine.
The other often forgotten conflict that involves children is of course in Sudan, where a civil war, now in its third year, rages between Sudan’s army and the RSF rebels. The scale of the suffering is enormous: in 2026, a staggering 17 million children are expected to need urgent aid. More than 5 million children have been forced from their homes—the equivalent of 5,000 children displaced every single day—many of them repeatedly, with attacks and sexual violence often following them as they move. Only yesterday, five more children were killed in another drone strike by the paramilitary RSF on a health centre in the city of Kadugli.
UNICEF has been clear:
“Children in Sudan are not statistics. They are frightened, displaced and hungry, but they are also determined, resourceful and resilient. Every day, they”—
like the children of Gaza—
“strive to learn, to play, to hope”.
Ending the child suffering in both countries, through all the powers that we have in diplomacy, aid and trade, is a moral necessity. Those responsible for that suffering should be held accountable under international law. The reckoning will come. It may not come this year, but it will come one day.
Kirsteen Sullivan (Bathgate and Linlithgow) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) on securing this debate. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Johanna Baxter) for her campaigning to return the stolen Ukrainian children. Worryingly, children are increasingly the deliberate targets of violence, including in the severe disaster unfolding in Sudan.
The UN Secretary-General’s children and armed conflict mandate has documented a severe escalation in grave violations against children, most of all by the RSF. The RSF, which controls most of south-west Sudan, has nearly 1,200 attributed violations against children in the past year. Those violations kill and maim children every single day. Sexual violence, abductions and recruitment are used as routine weapons of war. They are not sporadic acts but a systematic campaign of terror against children.
Forces in Sudan are using hunger and sexual violence as weapons to target entire ethnic communities. UNICEF and local non-governmental organisations have reported widespread sexual violence against women and girls, and against children as young as one year old—a baby. The children of Sudan will carry the physical and mental scars for the rest of their lives. As they rebuild and reconcile, they will need unprecedented support to overcome injuries, including the injuries of those who have lost limbs, and to overcome traumatic stress and the collapse of their entire world as they knew it.
I believe that we have a human obligation to support the Sudanese people, but also to account for our long and complicated relations with Sudan. I was contacted by a constituent concerned that British-made military components could be diverted to the RSF. Given the RSF’s atrocities, I want the Government to resolve that any diversion of military components would be morally indefensible.
I am grateful for the Minister’s recent response to my letter on that point. He confirmed that officials have reviewed over 2,000 licences, considering the allegations of diversion, and stated that there are no current licences for the reported equipment and none has been issued to the United Arab Emirates in recent years. I would be grateful if the Minister reiterated that reassurance, because vigilance is essential—we cannot stop. Our commitment to prevent British-made components from fuelling atrocities must be absolute and we must act with urgency, transparency and determination.
Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing this vital debate. As we have heard, today one in five children live in areas affected by armed conflict, displacement or related violence. Such children face a daily threat to their lives, their health and their education. Such children are forced to flee their homes, are pulled out of classrooms, are separated from parents and are exposed to violence that no adult should have to endure, let alone a child.
The damage does not end when the fighting pauses. Trauma, lost education and broken health systems follow children for decades. Britain has a proud history of leadership in this space. It has saved the lives of millions of children through vaccinations, nutrition, clean water and frontline healthcare; through support for UN monitoring and reporting for accountability; and through funding programmes that have helped to secure the release and reintegration of child soldiers. But at a time when the number of armed conflicts is at the highest level since the end of the second world war, the UK is choosing to look away: cutting aid to its lowest level this century with devastating consequences for children.
I will speak briefly about the conflicts that are bringing this issue into sharp focus. In Ukraine, children are growing up under constant missile and drone attacks from Russia. Tens of thousands of Ukrainian children may have been abducted and taken into Russia or Russian-controlled areas without consent and under coercive conditions.
In Gaza, the impact of the conflict on children has been devastating, as we have already heard. Hospitals and schools—places that should be sanctuaries—have been systematically and repeatedly struck. I will never forget the testimony given to the International Development Committee, on which I serve, by a doctor working at a Gaza hospital who was treating children targeted by drone attacks.
Save the Children estimates that over 20,000 children have been killed in Gaza, which is one every hour during the two years of war. Of those children who are still alive in Gaza, UNICEF tells us that there is a ton of emptiness and deep sorrow that can be seen in them. Some 39,000 children have been orphaned and 17,000 children are unaccompanied. Children in Gaza often play in areas that are at risk from explosive ordnance, putting them at high risk of injury or death. In turn, that is leading to high rates of disability; many children have had hands and legs amputated.
These children are suffering from hunger, disease, displacement and cold. Eight infants have died of hypothermia this winter alone, and over 100 children have been killed since the ceasefire. Some children need urgent medical evacuation, which is simply not happening at scale, while others are growing up with trauma that will shape the rest of their lives.
As Israel moves to tighten and in some cases end the registration of international non-governmental organisations, it risks forcing dozens of those INGOs to halt lifesaving operations across the Gaza strip and the west bank. The lifeline agency for Palestinian refugees, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which runs over 700 schools, has had its ability to function curtailed.
In Sudan, one of the world’s most severe and—tragically—most overlooked crises affecting children is unfolding in the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophe. UNICEF has warned that nearly half a million children are now at risk of acute malnutrition as the conflict intensifies. That is a stark reminder that for many children in Sudan, survival itself is becoming increasingly uncertain. Checkpoints are armed by boys—teenagers—while girls are at risk from endemic sexual violence.
The United Nations continues to verify thousands of cases each year of children being recruited and used by armed groups, which is a grave violation of international law. Children are deployed not only as fighters but as guards, scouts and messengers, exposing them to extreme danger and lifelong trauma. In camps in north Darfur in Sudan, survivors describe how RSF fighters killed parents and abducted children as young as nine, blindfolding them and driving them away. Some were told that they would “look after livestock”, which is a euphemism for enslavement.
The persistence of child recruitment across multiple conflicts reflects the collapse of protection, education and accountability, and preventing it must remain a central test of the international community’s commitment, and indeed of our commitment here in the UK, to the laws of war. Across all these different contexts, the pattern is the same: children are not a sideshow of war, but are among its primary victims. That is why the Government must commit to treating the protection of children not as a secondary concern but as a central pillar of their foreign policy.
First, our diplomacy must put children at the heart of peace efforts. The safety of children—their access to schools and hospitals, and the reunification of families—must be built into peace processes from the beginning. Britain has both the responsibility and the leverage to lead, as a major international actor and as the penholder at the UN Security Council.
Secondly, our humanitarian response must go beyond survival alone. Education must be protected, and schools must be treated as humanitarian spaces in a conflict zone. Mental health support for children affected by conflict should be provided for by core funding. A child who survives war but who is left traumatised, uneducated and unsupported is still a casualty of conflict. If we ignore that trauma, we should not be surprised by the consequences. Entire generations growing up with grief, anger and abandonment become a fertile ground for radicalisation, with many children and young people ending up in terrorist groups such as Hamas.
Thirdly, accountability matters. We must make every effort to ensure that crimes are recorded, that journalists are allowed into conflict zones and that we call out breaches of international humanitarian law wherever they occur. That must apply to allies and adversaries alike, because selective outrage weakens international law. We must name violations consistently, support independent investigations and back consequences when the law is ignored. Finally—
Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I congratulate the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) on securing this important debate. I also thank colleagues across the Chamber for their thoughtful contributions and interventions, not least my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and Malling (Helen Grant), who is not in her place now, but served as the special envoy for girls’ education during the last Government. I thank her for that.
Children are not incidental victims of war. Increasingly, they are its deliberate targets. Whether through forced deportation, indoctrination, recruitment into armed groups or the destruction of schools and healthcare, children are being used as instruments of conflict. That should shame us all and it should compel action.
I want to start with Ukraine, where the abuse of children has been systematic and calculated. Thousands of Ukrainian children—some estimates put the figure at more than 20,000—have been forcibly taken from their families and deported into Russia or Russian-occupied territory. Some were taken from orphanages and others removed from parents at gunpoint. Many are subjected to so-called re-education—stripped of their identity, language and nationality. Behind every statistic are a child, a family torn apart and a future placed deliberately out of reach.
The UK has rightly condemned these crimes, but condemnation alone is not enough, so I ask the Minister these questions. What practical steps is the UK taking to support efforts to identify, track and return abducted Ukrainian children? Through which international partners are the Government principally working? What progress has been made on sanctions enforcement against the individuals and entities responsible for these deportations? We know that evidence exists, so what is holding up further designations? Finally on Ukraine, will the Minister update the House on how the UK is supporting international accountability mechanisms, including the ICC, to ensure that those who have committed crimes against children are brought to justice—not in theory, but in practice?
I now turn to the middle east and an issue that requires care, seriousness and balance. Israel faces a real and ongoing security threat from Hamas, a terrorist organisation that cynically embeds itself among civilians and has itself committed grave abuses against children, including hostage taking and indoctrination. At the same time, children in Gaza have suffered enormously. Many have lost family members, homes and access to education.
If we are serious about breaking cycles of conflict, we must look beyond the immediate crisis to what comes next. I want to touch on reconstruction and education. Schools are not just buildings; they are foundations of stability and hope, so what is the UK doing to press for the rebuilding of schools in Gaza once conditions allow? Which organisations and mechanisms are the Government principally working through, and how are they ensuring that planning for education recovery is happening now, rather than being left to become an afterthought?
Education must never be a vehicle for hatred. There have long been serious concerns about elements of the Palestinian curriculum that risk inciting violence or glorifying extremism. UK taxpayers rightly expect our aid not to entrench these problems, so I ask the Minister this directly today. What pressure is the UK applying to the Palestinian Authority to secure root-and-branch curriculum reform? What specific benchmarks are being used, and what evidence, if any, is there of meaningful progress to date? How are UK-funded education programmes monitored to ensure that they promote peace, tolerance and co-existence?
I now turn to Sudan and a crisis that all too often slips from the headlines but which represents one of the gravest humanitarian catastrophes in the world today, particularly for children. Children in Sudan are being killed, displaced, recruited by armed groups and denied access to basic healthcare and education. We know that girls face heightened risks of sexual violence. Entire communities have been uprooted. Humanitarian access remains dangerously constrained. The UK has spoken about leadership on Sudan, so I ask this. Where is that leadership now, and what concrete steps are the Government taking to secure humanitarian access?
More broadly, across all these conflicts, children are paying the price for impunity. I ask the Minister about the Government’s overall approach to children in armed conflict: how is the UK ensuring that the protection of children is embedded in its diplomatic, development and defence policy—not siloed, not rhetorical, but operational?
Finally, what assessment have the Government made of the long-term consequences of failing these children, not just for them but for global stability? Children who are denied safety, education and justice today are far more likely to inherit conflict tomorrow. The Conservative party has long been clear that protecting children in conflict is not optional; it is a moral duty and a strategic necessity. The UK has the diplomatic weight, legal expertise and moral standing to lead. Leadership requires consistency, urgency and follow up, and I urge the Government to match their words with decisive action.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Mr Hamish Falconer)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing the debate. I hope Members will bear with me; a lot has been raised. I will make progress covering Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan, and make some general remarks on children in armed conflicts before taking interventions, which I will endeavour to do before the end of the debate.
We are clearly witnessing a deeply troubling trend. Not only is conflict spreading but, as many Members have said, it is becoming more dangerous for children. We must keep their welfare in the spotlight as we respond to these crises. The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Chris Elmore) would have been glad to participate today, but he is unavoidably travelling on ministerial duties. It is therefore my pleasure to respond on behalf of the Government. I am grateful to all hon. Members for their contributions, and will try to respond to them in the order that they spoke.
According to the United Nations Secretary-General, grave violations against children surged by 25% in 2024. Children are being killed, maimed, abducted and abused at staggering levels. That is, clearly, absolutely indefensible. We will keep pushing, loudly and consistently, to protect children wherever we can. We are focused on preventing these crimes, stopping them when they happen and pushing armed groups to follow international law. We are a party to the UN convention on the rights of the child, and we take our responsibility seriously. We play an active role in the UN Security Council working group on children and armed conflict, calling out abuses and pushing for accountability. We will keep championing the UN children and armed conflict mandate as well as UN monitoring.
My hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Chris Evans) pointed out that, this year, we are spending £450,000 on UNICEF’s monitoring and reporting mechanism. That is on top of £250,000 spent last year. We are working to boost global efforts and, on the question raised by many hon. Members about the Government’s strategy, we are looking closely at whether a dedicated children in conflict strategy is the right next step. I can confirm to the House that that work is well underway. We are also considering how we can strengthen our expertise on children in armed conflict through developing a new practical toolkit for officials.
I will turn to the specific conflict zones that have been raised. I must, I am afraid, repudiate almost everything said by the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan). We have been many things, but silent is not one of them. We have not looked away; we have taken tangible action in relation to the crisis in Gaza from the very moment that I became a Minister and we became the Government. I have seen for myself the horrific impact of that conflict on children in Gaza; I have seen it in the region, and on the faces of the children who I am proud we have assisted here in the UK.
I was asked an important question by one of my hon. Friends about the partial opening of the Rafah crossing. At the moment, that is being prioritised for those most medically vulnerable. There are still small numbers crossing on foot—mostly into Egypt, although there is some two-way traffic. It is absolutely vital that that crossing opens to the scale that it operated at before June 2024, and we need to see all the crossings opened so that medical assistance and vital reconstruction materials are in place to provide children in Gaza with the support that they need.
We cannot shy away from the scale of devastation in Gaza. Our assessment is that, since October 2023, at least 20,000 children have been killed. That includes 100 children who have been killed since the ceasefire was announced nearly four months ago. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh) pointed out, thousands more children are now living with life-changing injuries. It is a grim statistic that Gaza now has more child amputees than anywhere in the world.
Unexploded ordnance will continue to threaten lives even after the ceasefire, and it also prevents access to humanitarian assistance. That is why the Foreign Secretary has announced £4 million for the UN Mine Action Service in Gaza. We are providing £81 million in humanitarian early recovery support for Palestine as part of our £116 million package, but clearly the questions of access that so many hon. Members touched on are absolutely vital. About £10 million of that will go straight to UNICEF for infant formula, clean water, sanitation, mental health support, and assistance for families.
To date, UK-Med teams have supported more than 950,000 patients with consultations. We have provided nearly £30 million to UNRWA to try to keep education and healthcare moving. I will not provide too much commentary on the status of UNRWA, but I recognise the points that the shadow Minister, the right hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), made about the education curriculum. We are engaged with UNRWA on those questions, which we have discussed with it and indeed with the Palestinian Authority.
I want to address the deeply concerning reports of mistreatment of Palestinian children in detention. We continue to raise the matter repeatedly with Israel. Due process must be followed when children are detained, in line with international justice standards. The International Committee of the Red Cross, which has extensive experience of these issues, must have full access to all detention facilities.
As so many Members rightly pointed out, the crisis in Sudan is destroying the lives of children. We are showing the UK leadership that the Conservative shadow Minister asked for. This morning, after visiting the Chad-Sudan border, the Foreign Secretary announced a further £20 million in new support for survivors of conflict-related sexual violence and for women and girls facing violence. Our humanitarian support should help more than 2.5 million people to access food, clean water, medicine and shelter. UNICEF has grimly assessed that nearly 90% of Sudan’s school-aged children are no longer in school due to the conflict. Some 200,000 children in Sudan and neighbouring countries have received help to stay in school, but knowing the region as I do, I know the extent of the trauma that those children will be suffering.
Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine has unleashed some of the most shocking abuses that we have seen. Reports show that around 20,000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly taken to Russia or Russian-controlled territory. Another 1.7 million children live under occupation, and many are subject to efforts to erase their identity. The shadow Foreign Office Minister asked about who our primary partners are. We have committed nearly £3 million to help Ukraine to return these children home and support their recovery. Our primary partner is the Ukrainian Government, but we work internationally with our partners. The Minister for Europe is chairing such a meeting this afternoon to ensure there is continued attention on these issues.
I want to touch briefly on wider issues, including, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale—
Mr Falconer
I will come to the matter of Nigeria in a second.
My hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale touched on the importance of explosive weapons and de-mining, particularly in relation to children. I want to be clear that we stand firmly behind the agreements that will reduce these threats: the mine ban treaty, the convention on cluster munitions and the convention on certain conventional weapons. We also back the explosive weapons in populated areas declaration and the safe schools declaration. We are funding de-mining and education on the risks of explosives in 12 countries including Ukraine, Palestine and Sudan. Since 2024, we have helped clear 26 million square metres of land, helping to make life safer for more than 94,000 children.
Where we can, including in Nigeria, we seek to help children injured by war to ensure that that aid reaches all children affected by conflict across lines, including in Nigeria and the conflicts that I have referenced. I once again thank my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn for bringing us together for this debate. I know the degree of her personal commitment to these issues, and indeed the commitment of my other Labour colleagues who have worked on these issues both in this place and in their previous lives. This work could not matter more. We will continue to push for action to protect children caught up in warzones, because no child should have their young life wrecked by conflict.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered children and armed conflict.