Liz Saville Roberts
Main Page: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)Department Debates - View all Liz Saville Roberts's debates with the Home Office
(1 year, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe Government’s politicised language on asylum seekers inevitably stokes division between communities and people in hostels, but Wales has shown that things can be different. Last year, the national youth organisation, Urdd, provided welcome centres with dedicated support services for refugees from Afghanistan and Ukraine, and everybody benefited. Does the Minister agree that when the history books are written about his Government’s sorry record on asylum, it will be recorded that people in Wales strove to act with humanity and for community harmony?
I hope that when the history books are written about this Government, people will point to some of the fantastic schemes that we have created and that have commanded such broad support, including Homes for Ukraine and the Syria and Afghan schemes, all of which collectively have brought hundreds of thousands of people to our shores, where they have been welcomed into the homes of British citizens. But it is right that we make the distinction between those people—many of whom we have geographical, moral and historical obligations to—and the young men in safe countries such as France soliciting human traffickers to ferry them across the channel and to exploit our laws. This is an important distinction that we can see and that I think the British public more broadly can see, and the British public want us to address it.