British Council Contractors: Afghanistan

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)]

My Lords, first, I put on record my sincere thanks to the noble Lord for his constructive engagement on this important issue both during Operation Pitting and subsequently. He will be fully aware of my direct engagement on this. We welcome the opening of this particular pathway.

The noble Lord makes a valid point about accessibility. We are working directly with the three key partners that we announced in the three cohorts; the British Council is primary among them. The important thing is to get these people registered on the portal and here. The difficulties within Afghanistan are well known to us; we are of course working with key partners, such as the British Council, to ensure that we identify and look for safe passage for those of whom we are aware and whose details we have—although their locations may be sensitive—to leave Afghanistan and move onwards towards the United Kingdom. I cannot delve into more detail than that but I can reassure the noble Lord that we are working directly with the organisations we have identified and the British Council is a priority among them.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, we owe these contractors gratitude and safety because they kept British officials safe, in the British Council and elsewhere. I understand that the pathway to which the Minister referred is temporary—it opened today—and the expressions of interest can be made only in a two-month period. Why is it temporary and why will it not be an ongoing rolling programme given many of the complexities, only one of which was rightly raised by the noble Lord, Lord Collins? What will the turnaround time be between expressing an interest in using this pathway and receiving a final decision about accessing resettlement? Who is in charge of making the final decision?

I ask because, last week, my honourable friend Munira Wilson asked the Prime Minister about a case with a constituency interest. It concerns a former member of the Supreme Court of Afghanistan and a former government Minister who applied to be part of the ARAP scheme in October last year, received a ticket in February but has heard nothing since. The Prime Minister asked the Home Secretary to follow up; the noble Lord, Lord Harrington, was deemed to be the Minister responsible. I saw him in the Chamber earlier but he is obviously not answering this Question, although we are grateful that the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, is. Who is in charge and what will the turnaround time be?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I will certainly follow up with my noble friend Lord Harrington. I fully accept that there are undoubtedly cases; I am aware of several and am grateful to the noble Lord for identifying one. Let us see how quickly we can move through some of them. On the ARAP case he identified, that scheme remains open and will be open—of course, it is being administered directly by the MoD—but I will certainly follow up with my noble friend Lord Harrington. I am sure that one of us will be able to provide the noble Lord with an answer.

On contractors, the noble Lord is right that there is a time-limited window during which these expressions of interest can be taken forward. The window for this particular pathway will close because, on pathway 3, there is a limit for year 1 of settlement. Once we reach this, eligibility criteria will be applied on an objective basis. As I alluded to in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Collins, we are working directly with the three cohorts: the Chevening cohort—this is directly under the FCDO—GardaWorld and the British Council. We are doing so to identify, where we can, any information that we need.

Of course, when that window closes, another announcement will be made towards the end of this year for the following year’s scheme, when we will be able to identify an additional cohort based on the numbers we have identified. However, as my honourable friend Vicky Ford said, the number for this year is set at 1,500. Because of commitments that we have already made, priority will be given to those who are covered through the Chevening scholarships; those who are involved and engaged through GardaWorld; and, of course, those who were working with the British Council as contractors.