Afghanistan: FCDO Update

Ellie Reeves Excerpts

Monday 6th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I thank her for paying tribute to the cross-Whitehall teams that worked so assiduously under immense pressure. Of course, cases like the one that she describes could be eligible under the nationality criteria, depending on the nature of the dependants, or separately under the resettlement scheme. The particular circumstances will be relevant and important, but, of course, we will make sure that the full details of the resettlement scheme are published shortly.

[Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

The Government say that the number of British nationals left in Afghanistan is in the low hundreds, but in my constituency alone, I have 11 constituents stuck, including an 18-month-old baby, many of whom witnessed horror at Kabul Airport and, fearing the Taliban, they are now petrified and in hiding. When I contact the Foreign Office about these cases, all I get is cut-and-paste responses. What will the Foreign Secretary do to guarantee their security. Will he give his word that these British nationals will get home safely?

[Dominic Raab]

Of course we will do everything we conceivably can. One reason why we did not get everyone out was that some were afraid; the conditions on the ground were objectively very challenging. None the less, we are committed, both through our efforts with third countries and also in seeing when and how Kabul Airport can be reopened, to make sure that, as well as the resettlement scheme, we do everything that we can for her cases, in relation to the UK nationals, the qualified independents, the Afghans who worked for us and the other special cases. I am very happy to continue to support her in that endeavour.