Baroness Manzoor
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Syrian Asylum Applications
Baroness Manzoor Excerpts(2 days, 1 hour ago)
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Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I assure the noble Lord that people can still apply for asylum from Syria; what they cannot do is have a decision. There is nothing to stop people applying, but they cannot have a decision. That is because we need to review the situation in Syria, partly for the reasons the noble Lord has mentioned and partly because we need to look at the long-term situation in Syria. There may be individuals who currently have applications and who wish to return, and there is a mechanism for them to apply for support from the UK Government to cease their applications and return. There may be other individuals who wish to leave Syria for a range of reasons. This is not a unilateral action by the UK Government; it is one that is supported by Austria, Belgium, France and other European countries, and the pause has the support of the United Nations Refugee Agency. It is a serious assessment of the situation, and I hope the noble Lord will bear with us until we can resolve that.
Baroness Manzoor (Con)
My Lords, if I may, I will build on the question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, regarding asylum-seeking children. Of course there is protection, but I really want to better understand the number of children who have gone missing from our institutions and what the Government are putting in place to safeguard them.
Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I do not wish to, and am not trying to, make a political point, but when we came in on 4 July last year we discovered that there were approximately 90 unaccompanied children still missing. One of the first priorities of the Government is to try to find out what has happened to those 90 children who we were told, on 4 July, had gone missing. We are trying to track down those unaccompanied children. To go back to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Laming, we are trying to beef up the arrangements to ensure that local authorities and health trusts, and indeed the Government, know about unaccompanied children, be they from Syria, in the context of this Question, or not, so that the safeguarding process can be put in place.