Migration and Economic Development Partnership

Helen Hayes Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

One of my constituents has applied for his wife and daughter to come to the UK from Afghanistan, where their human rights as a woman and a girl are being denied by the Taliban on a daily basis. The Home Office refused their applications, but a court disagreed and ruled that they should be allowed to come. My constituent is distraught that the Home Secretary is choosing to appeal, seeking to stop this family fleeing persecution and being reunited in the UK via a safe and legal route. Why does she think it is a justifiable use of taxpayers’ money to keep challenging the decisions of our courts, as she has announced today she will do in relation to the inhumane and failed Rwanda scheme, rather than taking responsibility for the failures on her watch?

[Suella Braverman]

What is inhumane, I am afraid, is the Opposition’s stance on this subject. They maintain a principled objection—a ludicrous objection, frankly—to our measures, which will save lives, which are humanitarian at core and which will break the people-smuggling gangs. The fact that they continue to oppose those humanitarian measures is beyond me and frankly not in keeping with the tradition of the Labour party.