Resettlement of Afghans

Debate between Munira Wilson and Johnny Mercer

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer]

The support going forward is extensive, as I alluded to earlier. There will be £9,000 per family, with specific reintegration funding of £20,500 per person to make sure that happens. We had that deadline by 1 September because I do not want people taken out of school. Half these people are children, and they should not be in hotels. Some of the scenes I witnessed at those hotels were unacceptable. I was determined that we stick to that deadline, because it was the compassionate thing to do in the end. I pay tribute to everyone at Hounslow council, which I have visited, for doing a great job. That shows that if we all work together on these issues and take politics out of it, we can meet the challenge of strategic migration.

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

Let me start by putting on record my thanks to the Immigration Minister, the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), who, after 18 months of begging by me and my team, was finally persuaded to help me bring five British children and their Afghan mother to safety in the UK in June. That was after the father, who had served the previous Afghan Government and worked with NATO, was brutally assassinated by the Taliban. His much younger sister has been left behind. She is an aunt to the children but grew up like their sibling because she is much younger. She is alone with no male relatives, in hiding and in fear of her life because she is a target. Given the Minister’s repeated statements about honouring commitments to those left behind, and given this woman has a UK sponsor, a job offer and a home to go to—no hotel—will he meet me to discuss her case so that we can bring her to safety, too?

[Johnny Mercer]

If the hon. Lady sends me the details, I am more than happy to look at them. I recognise that such cases are out there. We were dealing with an individual over the summer who was known to us. We were trying to help him, but he was captured, tortured by the Taliban and killed in the middle of August. I am well aware of these issues. We will do everything we possibly can to make sure that we act in a timely manner. If she writes to me about that case, I will look into it.