Migration and Border Security

Lord Mackinlay of Richborough Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Again, I hope I can help the noble Lord, but this is a very fast-moving situation; we were not here this time last week. There are challenges in Syria, with people moving back there from neighbouring countries and the United Kingdom, and people, potentially, still seeking asylum from a new Syrian regime that they do not support. These issues are all on the table. I hope the noble Lord will understand, but I do not wish to commit now to definitive policy solutions to those issues, because the Government are reflecting on them. So I will simply say that the £11 million of humanitarian aid that the Foreign Secretary announced this week is a start. If the noble Lord and the House will allow us, those are matters that we can maybe discuss in slower time, when the Government have assessed the position fully and determined what best we can do with our partners to assist that position.

[Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)]

My Lords, much has been made of the Syrian situation by many noble Lords this afternoon. Does this not open up a question as to what the asylum rules are really there for? We do not know quite where Syria will end up—it is early days, as the Minister very correctly said—but many Syrians will be looking to go back home. During the years of civil war in Syria, Lebanon warmly accepted many Syrians, but it was quite bizarre that, during the height of Lebanon’s recent problems, many Syrians went home from Lebanon saying that Syria was safer than Lebanon at the time.

Are we not in a situation, if Syria does settle down, where we can consider whether temporary asylum is probably a better way forward for the world? Ultimately, is it not the case that the brightest, best, fittest and strongest people, having left their country at a time of conflict, would actually wish and want to return home to rebuild that country for the future? Is that something the Government would support: a temporary asylum basis rather than a permanent one?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his question. Individuals can always choose to return if the situation in their home country that they were fleeing and seeking asylum from changes. In this circumstance, we have temporarily paused decisions on Syrian asylum claims while we assess the current situation and we are keeping country guidance under review. With due respect to all noble Lords, we do not yet know how this will pan out; we do not know who the good guys and the bad guys are going to be; and we do not know ultimately what will happen in the new Syria that might emerge from the collapse of the Assad regime.

The same is true for Ukrainian citizens and others who flee and seek temporary asylum or relief from a particular war situation or from poverty and hunger. We judge those on an individual basis: asylum is given, or it is not; people are returned, or they are not. I would like to keep to that system, but recognise that circumstances change, as has been shown in the last week in Syria.