Immigration Act 2016: Section 67

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and I appreciate the time he spent explaining to me what he saw at the camps, which I shall visit next week. He is right: all of us in this country should be proud of the finance and focus we provide, but for every 3,000 people we bring over and help we could be helping 800,000 people in the region. We therefore must be very clear about our focus. As I said, we are clear that post-Brexit we shall want to continue to do the right thing for vulnerable people in the region. I shall be happy to work with him to deliver that.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) on securing this question. I make it clear to the Minister that what the hon. Member said was not based on false premises. I am able to say that because last week I attended the launch of a report from the Human Trafficking Foundation, following an independent inquiry into separated and unaccompanied minors in Europe. The inquiry found that UK Ministers have done

“as little as legally possible”

to help unaccompanied children who have fled war and conflict in their home nations; have turned away from a humanitarian crisis that “would not be tolerable” to the British public if they were more aware of it; and that by failing to offer safe passage are “unquestionably” fuelling both people trafficking and smuggling. Those are not my words but the findings of an independent inquiry. What will the Minister do about it? [Interruption.] There is no point in shouting at me because the Minister and his colleagues do not like the independent inquiry’s findings. The British public deserve to know about this. What steps are the Government taking to resolve the blockages in the transfer of Dubs children, which we voted for in the House last year, thinking there would be 3,000 transfers? When do they expect the transfers to begin?

[Brandon Lewis]

Transfers have been happening, and we are determined to deliver on exactly what we set out. We will continue to do so—it is part of the 23,000 people, and it should be remembered that we have brought over 7,000[Official Report, 5 September 2017, Vol. 628, c. 2MC.] children already. I encourage more people to look at what she refers to as an independent report, one of the co-authors of which is a recently retired Labour Member of Parliament. Fiona Mactaggart’s foreword makes many accusations and statements that have no evidence base whatsoever. I disagree with the report, but my point about the freedom of information request and several of the other statements that the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale made being based on false premises still stands.