Afghanistan

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Wednesday 18th August 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford]

My hon. Friend is correct, and my area of the highlands has refugees from Syria, too, and they were made most welcome by the community. In view of the hostile environment that we are seeing once again from the Conservative party, let us reflect on the fact that these are people who came here to receive sanctuary and who have gone on to make a contribution to our life. They were welcome, refugees are welcome and Afghans are certainly welcome in every part of Scotland.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Before the right hon. Gentleman was rerouted by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton), he was making a powerful point about those who come across the channel in boats, and the Government’s proposals for them. Does he recognise that, according to organisations such as Safe Passage, 70% of the unaccompanied minors crossing the channel come from Afghanistan, and to criminalise them is a criminal act in itself?

[Ian Blackford]

Yes, I agree with the hon. Gentleman. The Government must reflect carefully on this over the course of the summer, and change their ways before we come back and debate these matters again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

I supported the war in Afghanistan; I supported the war in Iraq. In politics, it is important to learn from your mistakes, but it is often other people who pay for them. Today, this Chamber should debate what has happened in Afghanistan with genuine humility.

There is no point in criticising the Government’s strategy; there has not been one. When President Trump announced his decision to withdraw troops last year, our Government should have prepared to relocate all those Afghan families to whom we owed a debt of honour: the interpreters, the medics, the aid workers. They should have; they did not. They should have fast-tracked all the outstanding settlement applications from British citizens wanting to bring their children and partners from Afghanistan. They should have; they did not.

Two days ago, my office phoned the Home Office hotline for MPs to ask what emergency procedures are now in place. My constituent and his three British children are in Kabul, waiting to bring their mother—his wife—to safety in the UK. The Home Office officer said that there was no such procedure and that she must apply “in the normal way”. There is no normal way! There is nowhere to sit the English language test and nowhere to submit biometric data. That was two days ago. Yesterday, we phoned again and she said, “There is something, but it’s for internal use only.” Eighteen months on, the Home Secretary has put out one internal memo.

One constituent has three sisters there. I dare not name them: they were key figures in the nation-building programme. They are in hiding, with no man to accompany them to an airport. They should have had information from our Foreign Office weeks ago about how the relocation scheme would operate to keep them safe and bring them to the UK—how we would fulfil our debt of honour to them and to all the interpreters, doctors, journalists and others now in danger. No such information came. That debt of honour has not been fulfilled.

The Afghanistan that we hoped to build 20 years ago may be lost for now, but our Government need a plan and a vision for the sort of world that we want to build. Afghanistan will be how we are judged in future. Are we to be trusted? Do we keep our word? Do we have the will to support the values that we preach? Do we have the foresight to prepare against the things that we fear will happen? Any dispassionate observer of this Government would have to answer no, but this is not just a political failure. It is a moral failure of which the price is now being paid by others: British citizens with family members trapped in Afghanistan, those who fought and served alongside our own valiant troops, the women, the religious minorities and all those who now face a well-founded fear of persecution.