Ukraine: Refugees

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 6th April 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, for securing this debate and for her powerful opening. I wish the Minister well with his maiden speech. He has had a few dry runs, so expectations are high.

Can the Minister confirm that, as of Sunday, only 1.6% of the 32,000 who have applied to come to the UK from Ukraine had actually arrived? The Government have apparently assumed that refugees are not wanting to move too far away from Ukraine, but it looks increasingly likely that other factors may be the cause. The Telegraph reports cases of permission to travel letters being sent by the Home Office but not being received by the intended recipients. A government spokesperson said that they were aware of a “technical issue”. What is that issue, how many families are affected and has it been resolved?

On Twitter this morning it was alleged that only one member of each family was being granted a visa, meaning that the family, wanting to stay together, was unable to travel to the UK. This was responded to by someone else who said that only two out of three visas for his family had been issued. Is this conspiracy or cock-up? Is this a deliberate move by the Home Office to keep refugees out of the UK or are applications from the same family not being cross-referenced and dealt with together? It appears that, whether by accident or design, the actions of the Home Office are preventing even those granted visas from travelling to the UK. The Home Office estimated on 18 March, when the refugee schemes opened, that it would be able to process 10,000 visas in that first week, but it actually achieved less than one-tenth of that. Can the Minster confirm that he has set a target of 15,000 a week and say when he expects to achieve it?

In the Telegraph today, it is alleged that the Foreign Office is refusing to provide staff to help to process visa applications, saying that it is the Home Office’s problem. It has also been suggested that, despite being offered bonuses to work overtime and rest days, processing is likely to be impacted by staff taking time off over the Easter holidays. Are these factors going to impact on the Minister’s ambitions and are, as has been suggested, things going to get worse before they get better? Can he also confirm that he has set a target of 48 hours to process an application for a mother and child, but that it is currently taking on average a week, and that phase two, whereby organisations and businesses can offer accommodation to Ukrainian refugees, has been delayed until after Easter?

The Minister is quoted as saying:

“We did not have, and we’ve never had, a proper system of administering the mass flow of people from abroad.”


This House passed amendments to the Nationality and Borders Bill to ensure that the Government set up and maintain the necessary systems, processes and support to local authorities to be able to cope with the sort of influx of refugees that we are currently seeing from Ukraine. If the Minister is correct, this would appear to be desperately needed. These delays are causing distress and costs that people cannot afford. Families here in the UK are desperate to offer a home to Ukrainian refugees, and Ukrainian refugees are stuck abroad with no money and nowhere to live.

According to the Telegraph, British families are paying thousands of pounds to keep refugees in hotels in places such as Warsaw, which they can ill afford, when they have spare rooms that the refugees could move into today. Sponsoring families are being left out of pocket and emotionally drained. Families who were linked up two weeks ago under the Homes for Ukraine scheme are still waiting for their visa applications to be processed and are not being given any information about progress.

Delays are being blamed on decades-old technology, with security checks being undertaken on a limited number of specialist terminals in secure parts of designated Home Office buildings, identity documents being processed through a second system and decisions being taken on a third, where data from the other two systems is entered manually. Can the Minister confirm that?

If these delays are inevitable, as the Minister apparently thinks they are, why do the Government not process refugees here in the UK, rather than before they travel? Why is it that almost every other European country is able to provide visa-free entry, but the UK is not? The Home Office is blaming No. 10 for insisting on a separate bespoke system for Ukrainian refugees. Others are blaming MI5 for insisting on security checks, while others say that the security services have no security concerns. Others are quoted as saying that the Home Office is insisting on putting security checks above everything else. On the one hand, we are hearing that Priti Patel was in favour of a much more open scheme to allow Ukrainian refugees to come to the UK, but her plans were vetoed by Steve Barclay, the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, but on the other hand we are hearing that MI5 had strong views on the need for checks, so not doing so was never really considered by the Home Office. Can the Minister please explain where the truth lies?

Another reported excuse is that the Home Office wants to avoid “Windrush on steroids”, where thousands of people would be left without the necessary documentation to claim welfare, education, jobs and healthcare. But refugees with permission to travel letters are being told that when they present themselves at the UK border they will be given an entry stamp in their passport and that they can then use the stamp in their passport to access jobs and services. I ask again: why can they not be processed on arrival?

When the refugees arrive, local authorities are asking for a clear framework for housing checks, guidance on safeguarding beyond the initial DBS check and a clear steer on what to do when placements break down and require rematching. They are having serious issues with data quality, including access, duplication and missing information. Families are arriving under the family visa route with nowhere to live and children are getting visas under the Homes for Ukraine scheme and arriving without an accompanying adult. Some councils are being told that the £10,500 is only for the first year and it is only available under the Homes for Ukraine scheme in any event, although those coming via the family route also need access to council services. Third-party support services, such as translation services, ESOL and healthcare, particularly mental health care, are receiving no additional funding. Can the Minister explain what additional support will be made available for those services?

Finally, can the Minister confirm that work on other visas, such as work, study and Afghan visas, has been stopped, as all staff are diverted to deal with the Ukrainian crisis? What will the implications be on other visa applications?

We are here to hold the Government to account. We need clear answers, if the Minister can provide them, or does he, like us, see a good deal of willingness surrounded by a great deal of confusion, inefficiency and ineffectiveness?