St Helena: UK Immigration

Jeremy Corbyn Excerpts
Monday 21st October 2024

(1 month ago)

Commons Chamber
Read Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Stephen Doughty Portrait Stephen Doughty
- View Speech - Hansard - - - Excerpts

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is no comparison with the £700 million of taxpayers’ money that was spent on four volunteers, as the Home Secretary just set out. This is a sensible, win-win, beneficial agreement that benefits both the United Kingdom and St Helena and involves potentially very few people.

Jeremy Corbyn Portrait Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)
- View Speech - Hansard - -

Can the Minister explain why the applications for refugee status made by people who have come to the British Indian Ocean Territory, as it is currently called, cannot be processed now? Why is he instead taking them to St Helena? Will he guarantee that St Helena is not going to become an offshore base for Britain to evade its international human rights obligations by simply sending large numbers of refugees there in the future?