UNHCR Syrian Refugees Programme

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Yvette Cooper

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend’s point is important. We simply do not understand the reason for not being part of the UN programme. As we understand it, the UNHCR will do the work of identifying the most vulnerable refugees. It will provide that support on the ground—that is exactly what it does as part of the UN Syria programme. Many of the elements of the Government’s programme—the principles that the Home Secretary set out earlier—are principles that can be adopted within the UN programme. Other countries have done so. It is unclear why the Home Secretary is so resistant to biting the bullet and why she wants the UK programme, which looks an awful lot like the UN programme, to have another name.

There is an explicit advantage of being part of the UN programme. If the Home Secretary wants to call on countries that have not signed up to the UN proposal to do so, such as Italy, Portugal, Poland and New Zealand, it will be much easier if she does not distance herself from the UN programme. Britain has the aid programmes and bureaucracy to run a parallel programme, but most of those countries do not. We should therefore encourage them to work with the UN and to be part of the UN programme. Surely there is an advantage in saying that the world should pull together. Britain should not go it alone, because we believe that no country alone should have to shoulder the burden of any serious humanitarian crisis. We believe in everyone doing their bit and sharing the challenge.

We will not fall out over this today. The most important thing is that the Home Secretary has come forward with a proposal that will help vulnerable Syrian refugees. The most important thing for the Opposition is that Britain is doing its bit and providing that assistance—that specialised assistance—to those who are most desperate and in need of her help, but I urge her to look again at partnership with the UN.

Let me turn to one wider issue before I close my remarks—other hon. Members have raised it. Hon. Members agree that there is a big difference between, on the one hand, immigration policy and border control, and on the other, providing sanctuary for those fleeing persecution. We agree with strong controls at our border, and with stronger measures to prevent illegal immigration and limit those coming to work, but that is different from the question of giving safe refuge to those in fear of their lives.

The Home Secretary has set a target to reduce net migration to the tens of thousands. That target is going up, not down, and the Home Office is under pressure to turn it around. However, the target includes refugees. Surely there is a serious problem if Home Office officials are inclined to resist any resettlement programme whatever the circumstances because it will affect the net migration target, which they are under such pressure to meet. I therefore ask her to give serious consideration to the net migration target to make it clear to everyone that there is a big difference between the approach to immigration and the approach Britain has rightly taken to refugees today.

Britain has a long history of providing sanctuary for those fleeing persecution. In the week of Holocaust memorial day, we remember events such as the Kindertransport, which hon. Members have mentioned, and which provided sanctuary and homes for Jewish children fleeing the Nazis at the beginning of the second world war. We have also seen the contribution that refugees have gone on to make to our country, building our businesses, enriching our culture and supporting our public services.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I am grateful to the shadow Home Secretary for giving way, especially when she is winding up her speech. Vulnerable and desperate Syrian refugees who fled Syria to escape horrific violence find themselves in neighbouring countries, some of which simply cannot cope. Does she share my fear that they are being driven into the hands of human traffickers? We have seen boats off Lampedusa. Does she agree that that is yet another reason why we need to ensure that the number of spaces we offer in this country is as ambitious as possible?

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Lady is right to describe the risk of vulnerable refugees getting caught up with human traffickers. The Home Secretary rightly referred to people coming to Britain to claim asylum. Some certainly have, but travelling across a continent and being able to claim asylum is difficult for the most vulnerable. When people are vulnerable, they are at huge risk from those who would exploit and abuse their situation. Part of the reason for the UN Syria refugee programme was to avoid the challenges they face—some people are simply too vulnerable to travel and to make their journey elsewhere.

We should recognise the huge contribution that those to whom we have given sanctuary in generations past have gone on to make in our country and their contribution to who we are today. Last weekend, I was in a community in west Yorkshire talking to police officers. One police community support officer who was out on the beat told me that Britain had given him safe refuge when he was 11 years old. His family were fleeing Bosnia. Now, he keeps Britain and people in Britain safe. That is his job. His wife, also a Bosnian refugee, is an intensive care nurse in the NHS, caring for those who are most vulnerable in our hospitals, just as this country helped her family when she was vulnerable 20 years ago.

Our long tradition of giving that help and sanctuary, and of providing refuge for the most desperate, is a testimony to what kind of country Britain is and wants to be. That is why we should stand together in Parliament to support that tradition this afternoon.

Immigration Bill

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Yvette Cooper

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right. Doctors have concerns about whether the proposals are workable in practice—the practical bureaucracy attached to the proposals—and the implications for public health. We think it is sensible to have better co-ordination between hospitals on, for example, cost recovery through the E111 system, but for any proposals it is important that the Government listen to GPs’ concerns.

[Caroline Lucas]

Building on the right hon. Lady’s point, does she agree that it is not only inhumane for doctors not to treat people with serious illnesses, but counter-productive? If somebody is here with a communicable illness, it is counter-productive for doctors not to treat them. This is just a nasty policy and a case of blaming foreigners to distract from the Government’s £20 billion of cuts to the NHS and the cost of reorganisation.

[Yvette Cooper]

This is a matter on which the Government still need to answer questions and they are confused about what they are proposing. The Bill contains limited measures, but they also seem to be setting out other measures that are not in it.

The measures on landlords take up 16 clauses—a quarter of the Bill. This, it appears, is the Government’s flagship policy on tackling illegal immigration. The only trouble is that we have no idea how it is supposed to work. There are more than 400 European identity documents, and the Government have not explained whether private landlords are supposed to know which one is which. There are countless different documents to show that people are entitled to be here. Will private landlords have to know each one? On some figures, nearly one in five usual residents, including British citizens, do not have passports. What will they have to do to rent a flat? When the Home Secretary was asked two weeks ago about how this policy would be implemented, all she could say was:

“There’s a lot of confusion.”

That is right, and the Home Secretary has done nothing today to clear that confusion up.

All these policies on driving licences, tenancy agreements and bank accounts will, according to the Home Secretary, tackle illegal immigration. How much difference will they actually make in practice, even where the policy is sensible enough in principle? One does not need a British driving licence to drive in Britain and one does not need a British bank account to take cash out of a cash machine or to earn some cash on the side. What difference will the measures make to the growing number of people who are here illegally because they are less likely to be stopped at the border and less likely to be sent back home? Deportations are down by 7%. The number of people stopped at the border and turned away has halved since the election. The number of illegal immigrants absconding through Heathrow has trebled, and the number caught afterwards has halved. Six hundred and fifty thousand potential smuggling warnings were deleted by the Home Office without even being read, and 150,000 reports of potential bogus students were never followed up.

There is still no answer from the Home Secretary about how many people came in without proper checks as a result of her bordersgate experiment. We get the same response from the Home Secretary each time: to blame the civil servants, to blame the landlords, to blame all migrants, to blame the technology and to blame the Labour Government. Her latest response is to blame the Minister for Immigration.