EU Borders: Refugees from Afghanistan

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

Let me clarify: no, that is not the case at all. If anyone has been accepted through the ARAP scheme or Operation Pitting, they can go to a VAC or be processed in any country in the world, so I am absolutely not saying that. What I am saying is that if someone is not coming through a legal route, they should claim asylum in the first safe country that they reach.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

I think that the answers to the last few questions show the difficulties since the Government have not yet outlined the full details of the Afghan citizens’ resettlement scheme, confirmed when it will begin or confirmed how many people are expected to join it. We are seeing some of the difficulties arising from that. The Government’s responsibility to Afghan citizens who have worked closely with our troops over the past 20 years extends beyond giving them the basic right to settle in the UK. The Home Office and other departments must surely support their integration into British life by beginning to help them to find permanent accommodation. In their Statement on Afghanistan this week, the Government said:

“Years before this episode, we began to fulfil our obligation to those Afghans who had helped us”.—[Official Report, Commons, 6/9/21; col. 21.]


Can the Minister say how many evacuated Afghans are currently being housed in hotels and other temporary accommodation, and how many are now in permanent accommodation?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

The noble Lord raises the issue that many of the people who have now arrived here are still in quarantine; many of the people whom we have flown here will be in quarantine until tomorrow, I think. He is absolutely right that it must be a prime consideration that those people can eventually be found permanent accommodation.