Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Catherine West and James Heappey

Monday 11th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Heappey]

There is a known number of people who worked in the employ of the British military during our campaign in Afghanistan. Our priority has been to work through and match the lists of people we know have worked for us with those who are applicants. It is my understanding that only about 2,000 applications are outstanding, and that 58,000 decisions have been taken in the past two months alone. Overwhelmingly, those decisions are, I am afraid, to say no to people, but we are making good progress and are nearing the end of tracking down all those we know have worked for us.

[Catherine West]

I return to the question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western): how many applicants are still being kicked out of hotels in the UK, and how many are applying from Pakistan and in hiding?

[James Heappey]

The Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) asked a very particular question about Afghan service personnel, as the record will show. I answered it, but I will need to go away and confirm, because that is not something that ARAP is intended to meet and we will need to see if we can find those statistics. The hon. Lady asks how many applicants have been removed from hotels. The plan is to remove all ARAP applicants from hotels, because they are not here illegally; they have not arrived on boats across the channel. They are entitled to be here, they have access to full universal credit and housing benefit, and much more importantly, they have the right to work immediately on arrival. Our priority, unapologetically—I hope she agrees that this is the right approach—is to get people out of hotels and into houses where they can get on with the life that they so deserve here in the UK as legal citizens.

Top Secret Document Leaks

Debate between Catherine West and James Heappey

Tuesday 18th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Heappey]

We certainly draw no boundaries based on seniority around the information that is shared bilaterally—UK-US—or within the Five Eyes, NATO or elsewhere. Information flows to where it is needed. An analyst who is the expert on a particular Russian capability might be a relatively junior non-commissioned officer, but they might be the best in the world at that area of expertise, so rank is probably not the right boundary to set.

But what we are very careful about—I think the United States and other Five Eyes partners are similarly clear about this—is that information goes to where it is needed, not where it is necessarily wanted. That level of compartmentalisation gives enormous assurance. Leaks such as this one are exceptional, rather than the norm, and it is important that we put this—no matter how grave it appears to be—in the context of the vast amount of information that is shared between the UK and the US and within the Five Eyes routinely, and which is never, ever seen by any eyes other than those for which it was intended.

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

There are clearly issues with the process of vetting individuals. What reassurances can the Minister give? He says lessons are being learned, but does something not ring a bell on the vetting problems we have seen in UK policing? What can be done holistically to look at the vetting of individuals who have access to information held by the state and to top-secret processes?

[James Heappey]

I looked anxiously for reassurance from the Policing Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), but my sense is that the police vetting to which the hon. Lady refers is a background and character check for a person’s initial employment, and therefore somewhat different from the developed vetting process that is used within Government—and particularly within the MOD and the security agencies—to assure access to top-secret and compartmental information. That process is extraordinarily rigorous, involving in-depth background checks that go back a number of generations, plus interviews and other evidence gathering that allows us a relatively high level of assurance about the people with whom we share information. The exact process is perhaps not something that should be set out in public, but it is one in which I and other ministerial colleagues have great confidence.