Afghanistan

Baroness Bakewell Excerpts

Wednesday 18th August 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bakewell (Lab)]

My Lords, I join those who have already spoken of their gratitude to those who have contributed so much in the past 20 years in Afghanistan, but I want to speak on what actions we can take at once in this country.

The Home Office will have to recalibrate its whole approach to refugees. Its shortcomings have been evident for many years to many groups seeking to help those fleeing persecution. Women for Refugee Women, Human Rights Watch and the Refugee Council all bear witness to that. In 2015, a British court ordered that deportations to Afghanistan be suspended because the country was unsafe. The Government had that decision reversed on appeal. The UK has slashed aid to Afghanistan by many millions in recent years, indicating to our allies a retreat from the world stage. This entire mindset needs urgently to be reversed.

As the noble Lord, Lord Newby, and others declared, the Home Office should now offer an amnesty to all Afghan asylum seekers already here and make it easier for families to be reunited. Emergency visas should be made easily available to those most at risk. Paperwork must be minimised. Home Office actions must support the many words spoken today. Britain’s offer of asylum to, at most, 20,000 over five years is not fast enough—or enough; 5,000 now will not meet the immediate demand.

Much attention has already been paid—rightly—to the plight of women under the new Taliban Government. When they offer reassuring words, we need to judge by actions. There are more than 1,000 women journalists in Afghanistan, 100 BBC staff, many hundreds of women practising law, and, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, tells us, 300 female judges. A high percentage of university students in Afghanistan are women—as many as 60% of the students at Herat University. They are rightly making their voices heard but we must not neglect the voiceless—the poor women and the women in minority groups. For example, 85 girls killed at a school in Kabul a few months ago were Hazaras. Hazara girls and widows are forced into slavery and child marriage. We must not prioritise the elite at the expense of the poor. Both need our active and immediate support. I hope that this Government will give it.