Afghanistan Policy

Nick Thomas-Symonds Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for her statement, and for advance sight of it. I also thank her for the briefing that was given to me by her and the Security Minister, and I welcome her to the Dispatch Box. However, given this vital work of leading on the Afghanistan resettlement scheme, I must ask: where is the Home Secretary? We hear that it is the Minister for the Cabinet Office who chairs the Cabinet Committee on this. As Kabul fell, the Prime Minister was on holiday, the Foreign Secretary was on holiday, and now, as we try to deal with the consequences, we have an absent Home Secretary. It is not good enough, and things have to improve.

Members throughout the House and their caseworkers have worked around the clock to try to get people out of Afghanistan, and the fact that, as we heard, email inboxes were ignored was a dereliction of duty by Ministers. On 6 September, the Prime Minister told Members:

“every single email from colleagues is being responded to by close of play today.”—[Official Report, 6 September 2021; Vol. 700, c. 34.]

Even that promise was not fulfilled.

Last week, I met people who had recently left Afghanistan and were starting to build their lives here. It was a solemn privilege to do so. I witnessed the pride that they took in their service alongside British troops, I heard their praise for what the local council was doing in supporting them, and I saw their gratitude for the fact that they were in a place of safety. However, I also saw their pain for those who had been left behind, fearing persecution and fearing for their lives. My question to the Minister is: what specific plan do the Government have in place for those still in Afghanistan and desperate to escape? She said in her statement that she was starting a process

“as soon as possible following consultation with the UNHCR”,

but what advice does she have for Members across the House on what they should say to those who are contacting them about leaving Afghanistan now? What assessment has been made of the number of British passport holders still in Afghanistan? How many who would have been eligible under the ARAP scheme remain behind? Can the Minister also update the House on the progress made by the Home Office, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Ministry of Defence on assessing the viability of specific routes of safe passage to third countries for those fleeing Afghanistan? If people are able to escape, are this Government really going to impose a cap of 5,000 this year, and what is the justification for that figure?

I have spoken to Labour local authority leaders across the country who have come forward to help, and our local councils need support. The Prime Minister mentioned a figure of £200 million, and today the Minister has mentioned the core tariff of £20,520 per person, but that is over three years. Local councils are providing support now. When will that money start to be paid? When will the additional £20 million in flexible funding referred to by the Minister be available, and what will be the basis on which it is distributed so that it is fair to councils across the country?

We are also hearing about the Home Office placing large numbers of people in inappropriate hotel accommodation, sometimes for months at a time, without prior notice or indeed even engagement with local authorities in advance. Can the Minister confirm that there will be proper engagement with local authorities, and that such accommodation will never be used on a medium-term basis? For those already in the asylum system here in the United Kingdom, the Minister mentioned that new country guidance would be published shortly. When exactly will it be published, and why has there been such a delay in making it available?

I want to conclude with a message of thanks. Thank you to our troops, our civil servants and other frontline workers for their work on the evacuation of British and Afghan nationals. Thank you to those local authorities and charities that have come forward, and thank you to the British people for their generosity. The people of this country have stepped up when needed, but is it not time that this Government did the same?

[Victoria Atkins]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his comments. He made some very constructive points and others that I will perhaps leave for Hansard to consider. He is absolutely right to raise the point about email inboxes. I can assure colleagues that a “Dear Colleague” letter is on its way into inboxes—as I speak, I hope, but perhaps a little later today. I know that the question of correspondence has been a matter of great concern, and I completely understand that Members of Parliament expect their emails and inquiries to be dealt with in a timely manner.

I pray in aid the size of the task during those two weeks of emergency. We remember, of course, the scenes on our television sets. We set up a specific helpline in the Home Office during Operation Pitting to try to ensure that emergency cases were flagged to us. To put that in context, in the first 10 days, that helpline received more than 5.3 million attempted calls. We have also had many thousands of emails, not just to the Home Office but to the MOD and the FCDO. What I can tell colleagues on those emails on which they have not received specific updates thus far, is that we are in the process of logging those. This is one of the difficult messages that I have to deliver to the House, but I must issue a bit of a reality check. We cannot process cases in the usual way if people are in Afghanistan, because we have no Army or consular support there. We are in a very difficult situation. I know that it is difficult for constituents who have family still in Afghanistan about whom they are distressed and terrified, but I cannot provide Members of Parliament with information if I do not have it. We are hopeful that international efforts over the coming days, weeks and months will change that. There have been one or two flights out of Kabul, and we hope that will be built on over the coming days and weeks, but I am afraid that we as parliamentarians have to be frank with our constituents that, at this precise point in time, we cannot give specific updates on people within Afghanistan because of the precariousness of the security in that country.

The Prime Minister has said that 311 ARAP people are still in Afghanistan. Of course, as and when options and diplomatic levers work, plans can be put in place to deal with them. Having had the emergency of Operation Pitting, we have to deal with the deteriorating security circumstances in Afghanistan.

The right hon. Gentleman asked why there are 5,000 people in the Afghan citizens’ resettlement scheme. We have proposed that figure very deliberately because we know, through our experience of the Syrian resettlement scheme, that local areas and local communities can absorb, manage, integrate and welcome that number. Again, hon. Members will understand that, having had the mass evacuation through Operation Pitting, we are quickly trying to find homes for thousands of people. That is why we welcome voluntary suggestions from local authorities. We need the help of all our local councils to be able to offer these people permanent homes. We are trying to do that in a managed way so people are welcomed into this country in the usual measured and constructive way that we had under the Syrian scheme.

The 20,000 figure is over three years. That is a shorter period than the Syrian resettlement scheme, which was over five years, because we want to frontload the work that local authorities and others do to integrate people into our communities as quickly as possible.

I have met some of the people. I asked a woman what her hopes are for the future, and she said that she wants to study for her master’s degree so that she can start teaching maths in our schools as quickly as possible. We have already welcomed some wonderful people, and we want to get them into the jobs market and using the skills and qualifications that they already have to all our benefit.

Finally, every hon. Member who has a bridging hotel in their constituency will have had contact from my Home Office team to explain the process. There are some 68 hotels across the country, and I will not reveal locations and numbers. I hope the House understands why, because we want people to move quickly and we do not want to add complications. The bridging hotels are a temporary housing scenario, and we must encourage our local councils to offer permanent housing. The more offers we receive, the sooner people are out of that bridging accommodation. I am always open and willing to answer any questions that colleagues on both sides of the House may have on this.

Again, I welcome the right hon. Gentleman’s support for the principle of what we are trying to achieve. I welcome his scrutiny, but I very much hope that the House, together, will be able to give the people who have already been flown into our country, and equally the people who come here in the future, the warm welcome we want them all to have.