Unaccompanied Child Refugees: Europe

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

I start by putting on the record my admiration for the work of the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen); I know how personally and passionately she feels about these young people. My right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) and I have faced online and sometimes offline abuse that I do not believe reflects the best of our British character when it comes to protecting some of the most vulnerable people in our world. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire and my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) mentioned their constituents, and I want to thank the people of Walthamstow who have reflected that sentiment.

I thank Debbie Bliss for organising the “Warmth from Walthamstow” project, which will take sleeping blankets and emergency blankets to the children who are still in Calais. I thank Rod Holmes, who runs our migrant action group and helps some of the people who are here to make the best of their lives. I thank Maud Milton for running the refugee kitchen that has been taking flapjacks to the children in Calais. I thank Katrina Kieffer-Wells, who runs Side By Side Refugees. I also thank national organisations such as Safe Passage and Help Refugees, which so valiantly fought but sadly lost in the High Court today—I hope the debate will continue. All those people and groups reflect the reality of the British public’s reaction when they see these children and what is happening to them. They recognise that our nation is a better place when we offer sanctuary, and today’s debate is about the best way of doing that.

Nobody is saying that we have not helped children; we are saying that the need to get things right is even more pressing today than it was perhaps a year ago. People may think that we have the resolved the issue, but conflict sadly continues around the world and the push factors that lead to people making dangerous journeys have not abated. While all of us may wish that the world were otherwise, the reality is that it is not. The reality on the ground in Calais is that hundreds of unaccompanied children are still sleeping rough. They need warmth not just from Walthamstow, but from our country.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen) on bringing this debate to the Chamber today. Last week, we were discussing modern slavery and the risk of human trafficking, so does my hon. Friend share my concern that if unaccompanied children are not rescued from the Calais camps, they could fall into the hands of traffickers?

[Stella Creasy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Indeed, we have seen many reports that suggest that that is precisely the case. When there is no safe passage, that does not stop people coming here; it means that the only passage available is through the traffickers, which we know is unsafe.

Today’s debate is about asking the Minister to ensure that we are being the best of British and that we keep these children safe, because we have a moral obligation to do so. Indeed, it is in the best of our traditions. We hear that the French police will not allow NGO tents, meaning that many children are sleeping without any form of shelter at all, including unaccompanied children as young as nine. We want to hold the French authorities to account, but we must also hold ourselves to account for what we are doing to help.