Oral Answers to Questions

Jack Brereton Excerpts

Monday 8th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

As I have said several times already, all measures are under review. Colleagues across Government are working to implement the hotel quarantine policy and the logistics involved in that, but this is not just about hotels. This is absolutely about compliance and enforcement, and we have measures in place at our ports and airports to ensure that people are being checked and to ensure compliance.

[Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con) [V]]

In Stoke-on-Trent, one in every 250 people is now an asylum seeker, putting disproportionate pressure on local services. What is my right hon. Friend’s Department doing through Operation Oak to ensure that genuine refugees are proportionately spread, instead of putting all the pressure on places such as Stoke-on-Trent?

[Priti Patel]

My hon. Friend and I have spoken about this previously, and I very much recognise the pressures experienced in his constituency. Obviously we have had accommodation pressures throughout the pandemic, and we are implementing a recovery programme, with which he is familiar. Within that, we are looking to accelerate, where we can and in a covid-compliant way, working with Public Health England and all the relevant organisations that he is familiar with, the movement of people out of contingency accommodation and into much more dispersed accommodation across the UK.