Unaccompanied Children (Greece and Italy)

Debate between Yvette Cooper and Catherine West

Thursday 23rd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen) and others on securing this important and timely debate.

I welcome the Government’s work to support refugees by investing in camps in the region and setting up the Syrian vulnerable persons relocation scheme. I also welcome the work with the French last autumn to clear the Calais camp and get the children to safety. There has been a lot of important work, including by the Minister and the Home Secretary, and we should welcome that. I also pay tribute to their work with the French authorities in the autumn that got a lot of kids out of deeply dangerous circumstances in Calais and Dunkirk, where they were at huge risk of smuggling and trafficking, and into centres. The work brought many vulnerable children to this country and safety. This was Britain doing our bit to help some of the most vulnerable and at-risk children.

We have examples of teenage girls from Eritrea who have been abused, who have been raped and who have been through terrible ordeals but are now safe in school in Britain. We have examples of 12-year-olds from Afghanistan who are now safe with foster parents, instead of living in terrible, damp, dark, cold conditions in tents in northern France. We have teenagers now reunited with family in the UK, rather than living in such unsafe conditions.

It is because such effort—that partnership between Britain and France—was working that many of us were so shocked by the Government’s announcement on 8 February that they were not only closing the Dubs scheme, but ending the fast-track Dublin scheme, which had made so much difference to the lives of so many children and teenagers.

[Catherine West]

My right hon. Friend is making an excellent contribution. Does she agree that when we heard that news it felt as though it was going against the will of this House and against those of us who had debated, voted and in good faith believed that the Government were going to do something under the Dubs amendment?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right about that, because this was a cross-party debate and cross-party work, with all of us supporting the Dubs amendment, just as it was cross-party pressure that got the Government to set up the 20,000 Syrian refugee scheme in the first place. There has been strong support from people in all parts of the House, and it was not for helping for only six months. That is the real problem with what the Government have done: it took them several months to get the Dubs scheme going in the first place, it has been running for only about six months and they have decided to pull the plug. I believe that is not in the spirit of the Dubs amendment that was agreed and passed last summer.

Refugee Crisis in Europe

Debate between Yvette Cooper and Catherine West

Tuesday 8th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Gentleman is right: we should look at all the different ways in which we can play our part and work with the UN. At the same time, the EU is today asking for 160,000 people to be resettled throughout Europe. The hon. Gentleman is also right to say that the UN has called for people to be resettled from the camps themselves. We should be doing that and working together. My proposal was a suggestion of a way forward by asking councils, but there are other ways to do this. The point is that Parliament should make known our commitment and view that Britain can do more to help. That is what people across the country are telling us. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we should be looking for ways to do more.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on securing this debate. Does she agree that the organisations involved include not only councils, but national charities and local bookshops? We also have a local Songworks choir, and local schools are making collections. Children in Hornsey and Wood Green have been inspired to collect food and blankets and to give their pocket money, and churches and mosques across the piece are also involved. Somebody came to an advice surgery on Friday who was a refugee himself. I thought he wanted to discuss his own housing problem, but he has raised £14,000 through a local charity called Comkar. He was in tears and had a photograph of that little boy. He said, “That was my journey, but I made it and I want to do my bit,” so could we also reach out to and help civic communities?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right, because people want to help. They want to be able to do their bit and they want us to show that we are also prepared to do our bit from this Parliament. One million people have signed petitions in the past week alone and £500,000 has been raised in 24 hours for Save the Children. Almost 4,000 people have offered to open their homes for refugees. Earlier this week, a convoy of 15 cars travelled from Birmingham to Calais filled with donations for refugees in camps there. Faith groups, community groups, workplaces, businesses and councils are also involved. A business contacted me this morning to ask how it could offer jobs to refugees and give them a new start. That is the kind of country we are—this is the best of Britain. We have to now make this the best of the House of Commons as well by responding to that demand for help and action from our country.

I urge the Home Secretary to ask communities and councils how much they are able to do to help, and to call an urgent meeting with councils, community organisations, charities and faith groups to ask how we can work together to address this crisis. I will hold such a meeting on Thursday, but they could come to her instead and be part of a Home Office and Government-led programme across the country, showing the leadership we need.

We need a clear plan. We need the Home Secretary to spend the next month working across the country to draw up a serious plan for how we in Britain can help and to address the target of how many people we can take before Christmas and over the next 12 months. Britain is showing how much it wants to do; now we need a Government who want to do their bit, too, and who are ready to live up to the country they represent.

There is a second area of disagreement. The Government have said that they want to take only refugees from the camps near Syria, not those who are already in Europe. They have said—this point has already been raised—that they do not want to give people an incentive to travel through Europe in order to get asylum in Britain. The trouble is that people are travelling already. They did not wait for any asylum statement by the British Government before deciding to pack their bags and flee. Rations have halved in some of the Syrian border camps. Parents are despairing that their children will never go to school. They cannot work or go home and they are fleeing to Europe whatever we in Britain do or say.

Let us remember that Britain has already used the incentive argument in relation to search and rescue. The boats were withdrawn to deter people from travelling. Instead, many more came, and many more drowned because the boats were not there to help. Refugees are travelling and there is a crisis now.