Antisemitic Offences

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Tuesday 9th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Kirsten Oswald]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making that point. The more we can do to shine a light on the realities of people’s lives, the realities of communities and the issues people face, the better. We are all the better—Scotland is the better, and I am sure that others would agree that the UK is the better—for our diversity and for the different contributions that communities make to that plurality of cultures.

[Jim Shannon]

We’re always better together.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I am ignoring that contribution from the hon. Gentleman! [Laughter.]

Scotland’s Jewish community plays a very important part in our country and civic life, along with other faith communities. It was right that the Scottish Government formally adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-semitism, as did my own party, and the continued dialogue and solidarity is particularly important at the moment.

I was privileged to speak alongside our First Minister, Humza Yousaf, at a moving and profound service at the Giffnock Newton Mearns synagogue in October, and the mutual sorrow, concern and respect between the Muslim First Minister of Scotland and the Jewish hosts of the ceremony was clear. We have to stand collectively. The joint statement of solidarity issued by the First Minister and faith leaders in Scotland is really important; that joint commitment to working to foster cohesion and good will across Scotland really matters. I am grateful for the meetings between the Glasgow Jewish Representative Council, the Scottish Council of Jewish Communities and the First Minister, and for the exemplary ongoing work of those organisations. The hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) mentioned a number of other organisations that are similarly doing important work.

It is really important that, as elected representatives, we have zero tolerance of hate crime and Islamophobia. The hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine), who is no longer in her place, spoke about the worry that antisemitism creates, and it is really important that we accept that in our roles. Like others, I have spoken to students and parents who feel vulnerable, anxious and unable to express their identity. That is unacceptable. Again, I am grateful to the First Minister, who has committed to meet those students to hear their concerns, and to ensure that they are well understood and can be dealt with. Our universities are there for all our communities, and everyone must feel safe and able to be themselves in them.

When I spoke to my constituents about Remembrance Sunday events, I was very sorry to hear some of them express a reluctance to wear medals or carry wreaths that showed their Jewish identity. Nobody should fear laying a star of David wreath or wearing a star of David medal. The irony that they were fearful at that event should not be lost on us. We have heard about incidents at such occasions and in day-to-day life. We heard about the young pupils who wear baseball caps over their kippahs. People’s identities are not to be toyed with; we absolutely must respect them. We all matter, and we must all feel safe.

It is not just the horrible spectre of antisemitism—we have heard some terrible examples of antisemitism—but the cumulative worry, the build-up of concerns and the impact on people’s general confidence about going about their business that matter. We need to seriously take account of the anxiety that people experience about the prospect of antisemitism. There is obviously considerable anxiety at present.

I am pleased that the Scottish Government recently published their hate crime strategy, which was informed by communities with lived experience of hate crime and sets out strategic priorities for dealing with hate crime, including antisemitism. That really matters. I also thank Police Scotland, which has been outstanding and constructive in my local community; it is very aware of communities’ worries.

I am heartsore that we have to have this debate, but I am grateful to the hon. Member for West Bromwich East for securing it. I am deeply concerned that a creeping intolerance has evidently ramped up over recent times. Scotland is a safe place, but it is important that we are clear that we are not immune from this old hatred. We need to stand collectively against antisemitism. We have a particular responsibility here, and I am keen to hear further how the Minister believes the Government can support that work.

Racial Discrimination in Schools

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Wednesday 8th March 2023 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I am only a small person, Ms Fovargue, so when I am hidden behind other people, perhaps you would not see that I was there. Thank you for calling me.

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate. I thank the hon. Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby) for introducing the issue. I remember when she raised it in the Chamber in a question—it may even have been in a point of order. At that time, I took note of her comments. It is very clear to me that there is an issue that needs to be addressed. It is a pleasure to see the Minister in his place, because I am sure that, as he always does, he will respond in a positive fashion to explain how the Department for Education and he himself will act to address the issue.

Education is fundamental to equality of opportunity as preparation for life, as a powerful influence on access to and advancement in employment, and in giving young people the skills to resist the dangerous temptations that exist in society today. There is no hiding from or ignoring the fact that racism and cultural ignorance exist in our schools. The hon. Member for Lewisham East has outlined that very well on a number of occasions. Often, children are unaware of the meaning or full impact of their words, so it is crucial that this conversation is had and that action is taken to teach children how to do good. The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) referred to how important that was in his intervention. It shows that there are occasions when people can take measures to promote better harmony in schools.

In 2021, UK schools reported—rather shockingly—more than 60,000 racial incidents in the previous five years, with a racist incident defined as any situation perceived to be racist by the alleged victim or any other person, including unintentional racism. Racism has proven to be a big issue in schools, especially in England. Instead of co-operating more with one another, our attitudes suggest to younger people that it is all right to behave in this way and it makes the segregation even worse, complicating the issue and making it much more difficult to control.

As you and other Members will know, Ms Fovargue, I always try to give a Northern Ireland perspective in debates. We have discrimination in schools, which tends to be more sectarian than racist. However, I have no doubt that instances of racism have happened over the years in Northern Ireland. Historically, Northern Ireland is a deeply segregated and divided area, and although we have moved mountains since the era of the troubles, young people have become accustomed to the history of our nation, whether socially—outside the education sector —or internally, in schools or other education settings. Sectarian words fly around and are often used incorrectly, especially by young people, and can often be seen as “cool”. The fact is that they are not and never will be.

The Equality Commission for Northern Ireland states that

“schools in Northern Ireland have a responsibility not to discriminate against pupils on the protected grounds of sex, sexual orientation, race or disability. The law does not apply to age, religious belief and political opinion and gender reassignment in schools.”

I struggle to understand why religious belief is not included in that law, given that it is completely embedded in Northern Irish history.

We are no stranger to talking about our past and how it has had an impact on current generations. However, I genuinely believe that more can be done in schools in Northern Ireland to tackle sectarianism and the use of verbal slurs by young children. There are ways in which schools can teach young people about all types of discrimination. My youngest staff member remembers taking a class in school called “Learning for life and work”, with a module studying citizenship. Through this module, pupils were taught about the benefits and the challenges associated with cultural identity, the causes and consequences of prejudice and discrimination in society, and the benefits and challenges of immigration for communities, society and the economy. Those are all very worthy things, which we should take onboard. Again, I ask the Minister this question: what discussion has there been with his equivalent in the Northern Ireland Assembly, perhaps to get a grasp of what is being done in Northern Ireland and what is being done here, in order to work better together?

It is really important in today’s society that young children are aware of the environment around them. There are more people emigrating here, so there are more people from different cultures, with different histories, traditions and countries. We have more of that in Northern Ireland than we have ever had before. It tells me that we have to adapt. We want to welcome them; I am very much in favour of that.

It is good that young pupils can look at who they are sitting beside, or consider the background of their friends, understand the disabilities that some people may have, and have a general tolerance—how much has tolerance been mentioned?—of people who are different from them. Poor mental health and bullying can stem from racial discrimination in schools and there should certainly be more scope for teachers to be able to take appropriate action so that children understand and treat their peers with respect.

On love and tolerance, I am trying to remember the name of the organisation that says:

“Love for all. Hatred for none.”

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

I am delighted to hear the hon. Gentleman use that phrase and I think he will find that it is the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community that coined it. It is very apt in this debate.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Lady for reminding me of that, and it is an apt phrase.

I always try to treat people as I wish they would treat me—not that I am any better than anyone else, because I am not. I will just say that if we all adopted that attitude, life would be a lot better, and for our children—who will be the elders of tomorrow, and the people who will have responsibility, and take our positions whenever we pass on from this world—it is important that we get this right.

Authorised Push Payment Fraud

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Wednesday 1st March 2023 Westminster Hall

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered authorised push payment fraud.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I am pleased to bring forward this debate, because I have had protracted discussions with a business in my constituency that has been targeted by fraudsters, resulting in some of its clients losing thousands of pounds through authorised push payment scams. Those scams deceive an individual into unknowingly transferring funds to a criminal. They now represent the largest type of payment fraud in the UK, both in the number of scams and value of losses.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I do not normally intervene this early, but this issue is critical for my constituents in Strangford—and indeed for everyone, I suspect. I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing forward this debate. The latest figures are astounding: £249.1 million was lost to APP scams in the first half of 2022. That indicates how prevalent these scams are. Messaging about these scams is not as effective as it should be. Does she agree that more steps need to be taken to safeguard vulnerable people who are losing money? They are not great at tech, and have been taken advantage of.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s concerns. In 2021, losses to this type of fraud totalled £583.2 million. That represents a 38% increase on the previous year. It is worth noting that a lot of cases of authorised push payment fraud go unreported, so those figures are likely to underestimate the true amount lost to these scams. As he suggested, the impact of fraud can be devastating. Victims can lose substantial sums of money. The impact on their health and wellbeing cannot be over-stated. Research from Which? showed that 71% of fraud victims felt that their experience had a detrimental impact on their stress levels; 63% said it was harmful to their mental health, and 39% said it affected their physical health.

Snares

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Monday 9th January 2023 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I am very pleased to speak in the debate. I have been a long-time sports enthusiast and I love the countryside. I live on a farm and am a member of the Ulster Farmers’ Union, the British Association for Shooting and Conservation, and the Countryside Alliance. I am also a member of Country Sports Ireland. I say that because I want to put things in context, and it is important that I do so.

I thank the hon. Member for Don Valley (Nick Fletcher) for setting the scene, and I understand that he is here to represent the petitioners, but I feel that I must represent what I believe to be a balanced point of view about ensuring the survival of lapwings and curlews, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned. On our farm, we used to have hundreds and thousands of lapwings along the edge of Strangford lough, where I live. Those numbers have decreased. Why? I would suggest that it is because of the predation of a number of animals and the move towards using the main restraints, as I would refer to them. We have to acknowledge that there has been a very clear movement among the people.

I am proud that the main thrust of country sports is conservation and preserving the countryside for future generations, and I have certainly passed on my love of country sports to my son Jamie and my granddaughter Katie. They have learned at first hand that our first duty is to sustaining the land and to the farmers who live around us, which is really important.

As the representative of a mixed urban and rural constituency, I have an acute awareness of the needs of the farming community. I am often guided by the needs of the agri-industrial sector in co-operation with advancing information and ways forward in our modern world. I am certainly not against change, but I am in the business of realism in what we are trying to achieve. I am proud of how farmers have taken on diversification and made changes that their grandfathers may never have understood. At the same time, I have a real respect for the generational learning that cannot be understood and felt through a report on a page alone.

I made contact with the Countryside Alliance, which provided the following statement for the debate. I will quote it in its entirety, as I think it is important that we hear it all. It says:

“Snaring is one of a range of essential measures used to manage certain species, the control of which underpins agriculture production, farm animal husbandry, the sustainable harvesting of gamebirds and the protection of species of the highest conservation concern, including the curlew. Specifically, it is a legitimate and effective form of fox control, especially in habitats where other control techniques are either ineffective or impractical.”

Whenever we say, “Do away with everything”, we must have an alternative. That is what I want to put forward. I think the Government have the alternative. That is the position we are at. The Countryside Alliance statement continues:

“In response to previous calls for the Government to ban the production and use of snares, the Countryside Alliance and other countryside organisations work with DEFRA”—

the Minister’s Department—

“to produce a code of best practice on the use of snares for fox control in England, which was published in 2016. That code reflected the current state of knowledge, following extensive research into the use of fox snares by different interest groups, snare design, operating practices, selectivity, and the condition of captured animals.”

[Kirsten Oswald]

The hon. Member is making a point about DEFRA and its involvement in this area. Could he reflect on his views on DEFRA’s independent working group on snaring and the paper that it produced, which details the kind of suffering and injuries that animals that are snared might experience? There is pain associated with dislocations, and there is fear, stress, anxiety, injuries to muscles, thirst, hunger, exposure and inflammatory pain, as well as malaise associated with infections. I could go on at significant length. I wonder if that is a part of the report that he has reflected on.

[Jim Shannon]

I am very happy to reflect on the opinion of the hon. Lady and others as well. What I am saying is that the snares of yesteryear are not acceptable, but the humane restraints that the Government permit today are a way of moving forward. When the hon. Member for Don Valley introduced the debate, as well as in conversations we have had before, he mentioned how the Department has moved forward. I say quite clearly that to have the snares of yesteryear would be totally wrong, because there is little or no humane control in them. What we have today with the humane restraints is a methodology, and that is what DEFRA has. I think there is a way forward.

The Countryside Alliance further states:

“Code compliant snares are a restraining, rather than killing, device, and only these can be used in England. Although fox trapping is not subject to the Agreement of International Humane Trapping Standards, research has also indicated that code of practice compliant snares, operated according to best practice, past the Agreement’s requirements for humaneness. As a humane and effective means of fox control, snares are an essential management tool that we cannot afford to lose.”

It also says, very clearly:

“Any changes to current legislation and regulations must be proportionate and justified.”

I accept what the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Kirsten Oswald) is saying, and I agree with her, but I think what the Government have on humane restraints is the right way of doing this.

The hon. Member for Don Valley referred to gamekeepers. I am a shooting man; that is no secret. I understand that we have to pest control animals, including birds. I want to see curlew and lapwing in the numbers that there once were. We have heard that on the Yorkshire moors, for example, where there were once 20 or 30 curlew and lapwing nesting, there is now just one. That is down to predation. These things have to be addressed.

The BASC has also highlighted that we must remember that the manufacture, sale and use of snares in the UK is already subject to legislation and various codes of practice, and that snares are a vital predator management tool that enables land managers to protect livestock, game birds and ground-nesting birds from predation by foxes where other methods of control are not viable. We must look at getting the balance in the countryside right and I believe that humane restraints achieve that balance. The shooting organisations—the Countryside Alliance, the BASC and the organisation that I belong to, Country Sports Ireland—believe that, too.

A ban on all snares would remove the latest, most modern fox snare designs, which should correctly be referred to as humane cable restraints. They are the solution and the right way forward, because they give a balance to the countryside and ensure that predators, including foxes, can be restrained. Humane cable restraints are used by conservationists and landowners to prevent foxes from predating on rare ground-nesting birds such as curlew, lapwing and golden plover.

I mentioned the area where I live, on the edge of Strangford lough in Northern Ireland, where the numbers of lapwing, curlew and even golden plover have reduced greatly. As I say, this is about getting the balance right, and control of foxes is critical so that some of our nesting waders do not become extinct. The hon. Member for Don Valley referred to that possibility, and it is the danger if we do not have some sort of control.

Humane cable restraints are also used by wildlife biologists carrying out research, with the foxes that are caught being released unharmed and a number being recaptured. Removing the lawful use of humane cable restraints to catch and hold foxes at times of the year and in locations where other methods simply do not work would have serious and unintended consequences for nature conservation.

I am a conservationist, and I am sure that everyone else present is too. As a conservationist, I believe that we have to find a balance and a means of control. I have seen at first hand—I suspect some others have too—the fox’s own “blood sport”, whereby he has been in a henhouse and killed hens. It must have been about 35 or 40 years ago, but I remember it well: two sisters had every one of their prize hens killed. I am also aware of a situation in which someone’s flock of ducks was decimated by the predation of a fox.

When it comes to finding a balance, I recognise that the snares of yesteryear are not acceptable, but I believe that humane cable restraints are. Indeed, it has already been proven that they are by biologists and others involved in conservation. It is important that we acknowledge that. The Countryside Alliance and the BASC, along with my local farmers—I live on a farm; I made that declaration early on—have made it clear to me that we must ensure that there is a viable, humane and effective alternative to snares. I am not sure that we have that yet, although I remain open to having my mind changed. I believe that humane cable restraints are that alternative.

The fact is that foxes do not merely decimate flocks of livestock—this applies to sheep too, by the way; a farmer contacted me after a dog had chased sheep around a field and some of them had aborted, and a fox will take a new-born lamb when the ewe is vulnerable—but destroy livelihoods. This serious problem must have a serious solution, and I feel that humane cable restraints are and must be accepted as such.

I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response. I respect her and I know that she looks deeply into these subjects and tries to come up with a methodology that works. The hon. Member for Don Valley referred to gamekeepers. The code of practice is clear that gamekeepers should check their humane cable restraints twice a day. They agree to that, the Countryside Alliance agrees to that, the BASC agrees to that and Country Sports Ireland agrees to that. Let us have something with balance, not something skewed by different interpretations. I recognise that the snares of the past were wrong, but humane cable restraints are the right way forward.

Violence against Christians: Central African Countries

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Thursday 23rd September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of violence against Christians in central African countries.

This issue concerns us greatly. I applied for this debate with the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) and others. We have a deep personal interest in the violence against Christians in particular across the world. Those who intend to speak and intervene understand that the issue is close to our hearts. I declare an interest: I am chair of the all-party parliamentary groups on international freedom of religion or belief and on the Pakistani minorities.

In the Chamber today there is a selection of right hon. and hon. Members who also have deep interest in these issues. I am very pleased to see a goodly turnout, especially as it is the last day before we go home. I often call this the graveyard slot because it is the end of the time before recess. It is important that we are all here to discuss this issue.

Across vast and growing swathes of the globe, Christians are no longer free to peacefully practise their faith. For many, threats of abduction, sexual violence and even killing have become a daily reality, and entire communities live under a constant and pressing fear. We hear the stories; I know others will tell them, and I find them quite hard to deal with. They involve my brothers and sisters in the Lord, so they are close to my heart. Those are things I feel deeply, which is why this debate is so important.

In its 2021 report, the charity Open Doors estimated that just in the 50 countries in the world watch list, 309 million Christians face very high or extreme levels of persecution and discrimination for their faith—an increase of a fifth in just one year. It is not getting better; it is actually getting worse. That is the issue.

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the charity Open Doors. Does he agree that its work is absolutely vital in continuing to shine a light on the situation that many Christians around the world face? It must be commended for that.

[Jim Shannon]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. I thank her for that intervention, because her words are salient to this debate and underline the issue.

Events in sub-Saharan Africa have accounted for much of that persecution and discrimination. There has been a significant increase in the number of violent attacks against Christians perpetrated by Islamic extremists. In Niger, Mali, the Central African Republic, Sudan and Nigeria—I will focus on Nigeria, as others probably will—the situation has become increasingly worrying. Many of us in this House—everyone who is here today—try to highlight the shocking and rapidly deteriorating situation in Nigeria, where the number of Christians killed last year rose by 60% on the year before. That illustrates the issue that the hon. Lady referred to. Open Doors states that things are getting worse, not better, because the number of people being murdered because of their faith has increased greatly. The stories of what is happening on the ground are horrifying. More Christians are being killed in Nigeria than anywhere else in the world. That is worrying for us all.

Rohingya Humanitarian Crisis: Covid-19

Debate between Jim Shannon and Kirsten Oswald

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Madam Deputy Speaker. The previous speakers have been crystal clear about the urgent nature of the situation. If it was not clear to us or pressing enough previously—obviously, it should have been—the covid-19 pandemic and the terrible price that it has wrought, especially among the most vulnerable, has confirmed once and for all that life in a refugee camp should never be considered an acceptable long-term plan.

Nobody would argue that the Rohingya community is not suffering disproportionately from this terrible virus. In fact, as far as we know—the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) made a sensible point about data—the death rate from covid-19 among the Rohingya refugees is 8%, compared with 2% for the Bangladeshi host community. Their situation, even on the basis of those figures, means a huge difference in outcome, in terms of life and death.

Amnesty International has spoken about a dangerous lack of access to even basic information. Mobile and internet services for the Rohingya were restored only in late August, and blackouts remain in Rakhine state. This is a hard time for those of us who are able to communicate and seek out potentially life-saving information, but what about people who cannot?

A huge issue is the inability to practise preventive measures such as frequent hand-washing in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions. We rightly place much emphasis on the importance of hand-washing, but when we do so we are supposing that it is even an option. We all keep ourselves socially distant wherever we can, but with the population density in Cox’s Bazar refugee camp, for instance, social distancing is almost impossible. In fact, Relief International Cox’s Bazar programme director has described the situation there as a “ticking time bomb”.

Existing healthcare facilities are woefully inadequate to handle a severe crisis such as this: in the whole of Cox’s Bazar, there are only two ventilators. We already know that Bangladesh has one doctor for every 2,000 people, compared with one doctor for every 350 people in the UK. There is a woeful shortage of PPE, even before the other critical issues in purchasing PPE that we heard about from other Members.

[Jim Shannon]

Yesterday, the Prime Minister—I think; it may have been someone else—referred to 90,000 ventilators being secured for the United Kingdom, although we have used only 4,000. Does the hon. Lady think it might be a good idea to send some of those surplus ventilators to help the Rohingya?

[Kirsten Oswald]

Thinking broadly about the needs of the people in this perilous situation is vital, so I am interested in hearing the Minister’s thoughts about the practicality of the hon. Gentleman’s suggestion.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reports that covid-19 is deepening the marginalisation and exclusion of the Rohingya, who are already in such a perilous situation. That seems self-evident to us, but it bears reflecting upon. Once the Bangladeshi Government announced a nationwide lockdown on 25 March, every aid agency worker was required to vacate Cox’s Bazar, which has had far-reaching impacts, further reducing access to education, safeguarding and mental health support. We have already heard about the vulnerability of children to exploitation, trafficking and abuse increasing because of this. Save the Children reports that almost 45% of the refugee population are not getting enough daily nutrition, which of course puts children at higher risk of worse outcomes from covid-19.

Worryingly, aid groups in Bangladesh have reported a rise in anti-Rohingya hate speech and racism, and rapidly deteriorating dynamics between the two communities—a particularly difficult situation. A recent report on the gendered impact of covid-19 on Rohingya communities also reports increases in forced marriages, child marriages, gender-based violence, transphobic violence, violence against people with disabilities and violence against female sex workers as the presence of camp authorities has fallen away, so the people on the margins already are increasingly and dangerously further marginalised.

Human Rights Watch also reported that, in Rakhine state camps and villages, 70% of children are not attending school at all. To compound that—if things were not difficult enough—in May this year, more than 100,000 refugees were affected by heavy rains, monsoons and landslides because of Cyclone Amphan, which destroyed shelters, washed away crops and further increased disease. Those multifaceted threats faced by the Rohingya are not going away during the pandemic, they are getting worse. It is vital that the UK Government are aware of and focused on that and continue to provide sustained financial support. With that in mind, it is deeply concerning that the UK Government confirmed on 23 July this year that they will slash international aid spending by £2.9 billion across the board, reportedly reallocating fund towards countries with which we have future trading prospects.

There is absolutely no doubt that 2020 has seen violence against the remaining Rohingya in Myanmar escalate once again. The situation has taken on an increased complexity. While the international community remains understandably hyper-focused on addressing the virus domestically and on their economic situations, the violence and persecution that the Rohingya people face has not stopped, despite the International Court of Justice ordering Myanmar’s leadership to take all measures within their power to stop the killing or harming of the Rohingya people, as set out under article 2 of the genocide convention.

More children were maimed in the first three months of this year in Myanmar than in the whole of 2019, according to Save the Children, while 19,000 Rohingya people fled their homes in the Kyauktaw township in Myanmar between the end of August and the beginning of September. Despite the International Court of Justice’s ordering the Tatmadaw not to destroy evidence of crimes, new UN satellite images show that the military has bulldozed the ruins of Kan Kya—just one example of the almost 400 Rohingya villages destroyed by the Myanmar military in 2017 as part of a wider cover-up. Overall it could not be a more dangerous situation and of course, if continued violence in Rakhine state makes repatriation less viable as time goes on, it grows more perilous.

International Rescue Committee figures show that only 4% of the Rohingya in Cox’s Bazar have actually been granted refugee status and that means for almost all of them that services and employment cannot be sought in Bangladesh. It is important that in the long run, the international community makes an active and focused effort to help resettle Rohingya people permanently in Bangladesh or in third countries, as seen with other refugee groups such as the Lhotshampa refugees in Nepal.

It has been evident since the covid crisis began that there has been an increase in the number of Rohingya people moving from both Bangladesh and Myanmar to Malaysia and other countries in south-east Asia, largely on boats that are not fit for that purpose. Myanmar must undoubtedly address the root cause of the issue of statelessness of the Rohingya if the plight of those boat people is to be resolved.

Amnesty International has warned that,

“Regional governments cannot let their seas become graveyards.”

The SNP stands by calls from Amnesty International to allow safe disembarkation and for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations members to urgently agree emergency measures to prevent further humanitarian crisis.

Bangladesh has built housing for 100,000 people—we have heard about this from the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum)—on the remote silt island of Bhasan Char, with plans to relocate some of the Cox’s Bazar residents there. There are concerning reports emerging of Bangladeshi military officers beating refugees, including children, who are protesting their detention on the island. An Amnesty International report alleges that sexual assaults have taken place against Rohingya women on the island. It is critical that the UK Government increase international pressure to allow UN experts to conduct an independent assessment of the island to ensure that any relocation there is voluntary and that it is truly habitable, which has been questioned by the former UN special rapporteur for Myanmar, Yanghee Lee. Our global mechanisms for accountability and the protection of human rights have clearly failed the Rohingya people so far, and it is essential that we have a renewed focus on not allowing that to continue.

It is disappointing that the UK Government have still not heeded the repeated calls that my colleagues have made about adopting a national strategy of atrocity prevention; that is a gaping hole in UK foreign policy that should be urgently filled. My hon. Friends the Members for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) and for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) have been focused on keeping this issue on the agenda. My hon. Friend the Member for Lanark and Hamilton East specifically pressed on this matter just weeks ago, and that echoed calls from my hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Alyn Smith). That is critical because if these cross-Whitehall prediction and prevention frameworks are left out of the upcoming integrated review, that will represent a body blow to all those who wish to see the UK Government play a greater role in ensuring that all possible steps are taken at each stage to prevent mass atrocities from happening, which is surely what we all want.

To conclude, as the Myanmar genocide against the Rohingya shows few signs of relenting, surely such a strategy could not be more pressing. I would encourage the Minister to give some thought to that as part of the bigger picture in how we support and deal with the perilous and terrible situation facing the Rohingya people.