Refugee Family Reunion

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

That is absolutely correct; I could not have put it better myself. I thank the hon. Lady, who is co-sponsoring this debate, for that invaluable intervention pointing out our international obligations.

I agree that it is in the best interests of children to be with their parents, and I must make a remark about the utter revulsion and disgust many of us feel about what is happening in the United States of America, with migrant children being taken from their parents. I am at a loss as to whether that is stupidity or evil—I cannot decide which, but it is certainly not a good situation. I think that all of us know that when children are being ripped from their parents in such a way, we do not need quotations. The American Administration have used biblical quotations, but we all know in our hearts that that is wrong. We do not need to quote and counter-quote, and make arguments about this. If those in the Administration of the United States of America do not know in their hearts that there is something very wrong with that, there is something wrong with their moral compass, and I do hope that that all changes.

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, and I am sure everybody in the Chamber thinks what has been happening in the US is abhorrent. Would not the best reaction from this Government be to set an example on family reunification, and to take away the threat and anxiety of young people, in particular, who fear being sent out of the country when they approach their 18th birthday? If I was not in the Chamber, I would be at the weekly refugee lunch that Refugees Welcome puts on in Hammersmith. Voluntary organisations are doing a fantastic job, as the hon. Gentleman says, but we need leadership from the Government.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for missing his lunch to be here. He makes a fantastic point about the fear that people feel. When we speak to and get to know refugees, what we learn can seem almost mundane, given the big picture we are trying to sort out legally, but when we drill down to the personal level, we see that people are not sleeping at night due to fear and worry. Their fear might not even be for themselves; it might, as I know from one case, be fear for a sister in a refugee camp in Sudan. The fear is that the sister will try to do what her brother did and go through the Sahara with people traffickers, when he saw unspeakable things happening to women. The fear is of the sister being so desperate in the refugee camp that she will jump from that frying pan into a very horrible fire.

I have talked about my private Member’s Bill and what an independent Scotland would do, but I hope the Government will take these matters forward in an immigration Bill. It would be to their great credit if they did, and that could mean that my private Member’s Bill would be seen as redundant in the next few months. I know that an immigration Bill is coming. [Interruption.] I see a smile from the Minister. Perhaps it is a rueful smile, but we might see some progress in that Bill. I am sure that the Minister and many members of the Government agree. Indeed, there is now a new broom at the Home Office—we have seen some fantastic things happening.

I give credit where credit is due: the Financial Times pointed out a week last Monday the difficulty in getting doctors to come in, and by the following Friday that seemed to be resolved, much to the benefit of doctors themselves. Everybody in the health service was a winner, and the Government are getting the credit. If we could now also sort out the issue of work visas for crews of fishing boats on the west coast of Scotland, that would be fantastic. Everybody in Scotland wants that to happen; we are just dealing with a person or two in London who does not let it happen, but it is damaging our economy. Interestingly, these migrant workers would not be included in the migration figures, and boats would be back fishing and there would be processing going on. But I digress; that was more of a personal conversation between me and the Minister. Some of my constituents at home will be pleased that I have raised this matter, however, and they will see the link between all these issues.

I know that many Members want to speak, and it was flagged to me that some wanted to intervene—most of them have done so. When working with refugees we become aware of many things, and the point made by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside that I mentioned earlier was very valid: the public are absolutely onside when politicians are courageous enough to make a case, and do not run for the quick populist hit of just talking numbers, but instead start talking about human beings.

I am coming to the end of my remarks, but I want to give the final word to a refugee who recited a poem last night at Speaker’s House. Being from Scotland, and particularly Gaelic Scotland, I know of the poets who have communicated to people in many ways that speech makers and any number of orators cannot. I am thinking back into history of Alasdair mac Mhaighstir, Somhairle Maclean and Iain Lom, who Max Hastings credited as being perhaps the first war journalist ever. Iain Lom was hiding behind a rock at the battle of Inverlochy in 1645 when Alasdair Mac Colla came up and asked what he was doing behind a rock. Iain Lom said, “Well, if I get killed today, who is going to be praising your heroism tomorrow, Alasdair?” There is a great deal to be said for poets generally, but the poet last night absolutely blew my socks off. He was fantastic at communicating his issues among the other refugees I met in Speaker’s House last night. Some of them consider themselves to have been refugees all their lives. I have tried to think of “refugee” as a temporary status before the person becomes a welder—like Yohannes from Canterbury, whom we spoke of on 16 March—a doctor or another productive member of society.



I met a woman from Somalia who, although she was a refugee, dreamed of going home. I asked her whether she would maintain her language skills and pass them on to her children and she said she would, which is a good thing. People in Gaelic Scotland—probably also in Wales and, indeed, in England—are pleased when migrants go off to countries such as Australia and New Zealand and maintain their language skills. We in Gaelic Scotland are very pleased when people come back from Nova Scotia, Ceap Breatainn in particular, and have maintained their languages. If we want that as a set of values for ourselves, surely we could allow, enable and help refugees to maintain their culture and language. Wearing my Chair of the International Trade Committee cap, it is important that we have such skills in the UK going forward, so that when those countries become more prosperous and trade with us, we can trade with them using citizens who still have those language skills.

I want to indulge the House awhile with J. J. Bola’s poem from last night because—with the greatest of respect to today’s speakers—he puts into words what it is like to be a refugee much better than any Member here today could and certainly better than I could. He asked me to point out that he was a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the dictatorship has led to 6 million people being killed and many more displaced. I think he said last night that he arrived in the UK at the age of six. I will finish off with his words because they are worth thinking about. He wrote:

“imagine how it feels to be chased out of home. to have your grip ripped. loosened from your fingertips something you so dearly held on to. like a lovers hand that slips when pulled away you are always reaching.

my father would speak of home. Reaching. speaking of familiar faces. girl next door

who would eventually grow up to be my mother. the fruit seller at the market. the lonely man at the top of the road who nobody spoke to. and our house at the bottom of the street

lit up by a single flickering lamp

where beyond was only darkness. there

they would sit and tell stories

of monsters that lurked and came only at night to catch the children who sat and listened to stories of monsters that lurked.

this is how they lived. each memory buried.

an artefact left to be discovered by archaeologists. the last words on a dying family member’s lips. this was sacred.

not even monsters could taint it.

but there were monsters that came during the day. monsters that tore families apart with their giant hands. and fingers that slept on triggers. the sound of gunshots ripping through the sky became familiar like the tapping of rain fall on a window sill.

monster that would kill and hide behind speeches, suits and ties. monsters that would chase families away forcing them to leave everything behind.

i remember when we first stepped off the plane. everything was foreign.

unfamiliar. Uninviting. even the air in my lungs left me short of breath.

we came here to find refuge. they called us refugees so we hid ourselves in their language until we sounded just like them. changed the way we dressed to look just like them.

made this our home until we lived just like them and began to speak of familiar faces. girl next door who would grow up to be a

mother. the fruit seller at the market.

the lonely man at the top of the road

who nobody spoke to. and our house at the bottom of the street lit up by a single flickering lamp to keep away the darkness.

there we would sit and watch police that lurked and came only at night to arrest the youths who sat and watched police that lurked and came only at night. this is how we lived.

i remember one day i heard them say to me

they come here to take our jobs

they need to go back to where they came from

not knowing that i was one of the ones who came. i told them that a refugee is simply

someone who is trying to make a home.

so next time when you go home, tuck your children in and kiss your families goodnight be glad that the monsters

never came for you.

in their suits and ties.

never came for you.

in the newspapers with the media lies.

never came for you.

that you are not despised.

and know that deep inside the hearts of each and every one of us

we are all always reaching for a place that we can call home.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Thangam Debbonaire]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. It seems to me that, as he said, this argument is cutting through: someone with confirmed refugee status should be able to live with their family. To be clear, for the record, we are talking about people who have their status settled and want to be with their family. I agree with the points that some Members make about clarifying who is who and whether or not they have a right to be here, but we do have a process and once someone has their status confirmed, they should be allowed to be reunited with their family. I will be working with the hon. Gentleman and others to capitalise on this political and public progress, and push the progress of this Bill and a separate similar Bill in the House of Lords. I look forward to hearing from the Minister, whom I know to be a very honourable woman. I have had meetings with her and was pleased to discuss these matters with her. I hope she can commit today at least to bringing forward the money resolution, so that we can get this Bill moving and at least debate this, to the satisfaction of our constituents as well as Members across the House.

It is a difficult and perhaps tense moment to mention the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, as we have spent a lot of time on it over the past few months. Indeed, I cannot remember a time when we were not debating it, although it now looks like that period is coming to a close. As part of that Bill, I was glad the Government took on a significant part of the amendment from my friend and colleague Lord Alf Dubs, as well as that proposed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper). She proposed additional changes to maintain the current situation in relation to the obligations we have under our membership of the EU and the Dublin III convention. I am not going to go into detail, but I wish to acknowledge that that is a positive step, although it does not remove the need for the private Members’ Bills to make further progress, as those provisions do not contain all that those Bills contain.

I wish to echo what the hon. Member for Harborough has said about the right to work and tentatively suggest to all colleagues that they should remember that refugees come here with skills and want to work. They do not come here to claim benefits. They want to contribute. Every refugee I have ever met has said, “I want to contribute my skills.” They want to be able to work, but, except with specific permission, they are not allowed to until they have been granted asylum by the Home Office. That would be okay, except that the Home Office target to complete asylum decisions within six months is frequently missed. In my case load, for whatever reason—I am prepared to accept there may be good reasons—that target is, unfortunately, more often honoured in the breach than in the observance. It is often missed by months or even years, which means that skilled people are meanwhile left without opportunities to maintain their skills, support their families and contribute to the national and local economy. This also makes it harder for them to integrate when they are eventually given status. As the hon. Gentleman mentioned, they often face restrictions on volunteering. This makes family life harder and makes it particularly difficult for people to get towards the point where they can earn the money they need to reunite their family members and bring their families back together.

Hon. Members may or not be aware that, by contrast, Uganda allows refugees to work immediately, and provides them with land to grow food on and start-up finance to set up their own businesses, if that is what they wish to do. Other countries have also given us useful models. We should at the very least consider a principle of the right to work after six months, which would also encourage the Minister’s Department to end those delays, and the right to volunteer until they can work. I would prefer us to move towards a system where the default setting is the right to work or the right to volunteer, and ideally both. Of course, we need to discuss that and how it would work, but I would like us at least to be considering it as a principle.

There are many other things we can do to improve the way we treat refugees and reunite families, including ending indefinite immigration detention. That is not the subject of this debate, so I am not going to discuss it. We could also restore legal aid, so that refugees can be reunited with their families; prioritise free, high-quality English language teaching; and do more to create safe and legal routes to the UK, with refugee schemes such as the excellent vulnerable persons resettlement scheme. I applaud the Government’s efforts to keep that scheme going and make it is as good as it is, but I would like it to be made easier to make in-country or border applications for asylum and resettlement. Keeping people in refugee camps or on the borders at best leaves people in limbo for years and at worst creates a recruiting ground for people traffickers and people who sexually exploit women. We all want to prevent those dangerous journeys—we share that aim—but the way of preventing them is not by making it harder to claim family reunion; it is by increasing safe and legal routes.

[Andy Slaughter]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech, because she is talking about some of the practical steps the Government can take. Children I have visited in the Calais camps—as close as that—have the prima facie right under the Dubs amendment and Dublin III to come here but are simply not being assessed. They will therefore eventually risk their lives under trains or lorries in order to get here. Those are the sorts of issues, along with the funding of English language teaching and the right of asylum seekers to work here, that would make a practical difference and would help this country.

[Thangam Debbonaire]

I thank my hon. Friend for making those excellent points. He is absolutely right to say that there are children in Calais—other hon. Members have been to see them, too—who appear to have a relative who already has status in this country, and who should be here. Making those safe and legal routes available is very important in order to protect children and adults.

In closing, let me say that the forthcoming immigration Bill may give us scope to support amendments in many of these areas, and I hope it does, but we need to create other opportunities to improve the treatment of those looking for sanctuary in this country and to improve our welcome. I urge Members from across the House to read the report that my all-party group compiled, researched and wrote last year, “Refugees Welcome?”. One recommendation was about the right to work, but others were about the other matters I have mentioned. We can all improve the welcome that we as Members of Parliament give to our own constituents. I have been learning Arabic for the past 18 months to make myself a better MP for Syrian and other middle eastern refugees. I am smiling because it is very slow progress—painfully slow; they are learning English faster than I am learning Arabic—but the idea is to make that welcome as genuine and sincere as possible.

This is about who we are as a country. It is about how we want to be seen in the world. It is about the fact that in our increasingly, heartbreakingly divided world, differences are reinforced more than they are bridged. It is about those countries that live out their values and provide safe haven for those who flee war and persecution. Those are the countries that light up a more hopeful future for us all.