Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 14th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I have enormous sympathy for the hon. Lady. One of the reasons why Lord Harrington has joined my Department and is working with the Home Office is to ensure that we can get people whom we have accepted out of hotel accommodation, which is unsuitable for the long term, and into the community, but that requires us to ensure that those local authorities receiving individuals are supported in the way they are. I would be more than happy to return to the House to outline the steps we are taking to deal with this situation, but it comes back to the essential point that the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), brought out. As we show a warm welcome to people who are fleeing persecution, we need to ensure that that welcome can be truly stable and secure. That means additional accommodation, which means moving beyond hotels and local authorities, and that is why the Homes for Ukraine scheme harnesses the kindness of civil society, but there is more that we must do, and we will update the House in due course.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I strongly welcome the scheme that my right hon. Friend has set out. It was Sir Nicholas Winton who said:

“If something is not impossible, then there must be a way to do it”.

May I ask my right hon. Friend if he would extend the scheme, or the imagination he has set out today, to make sure that Britain offers a refuge to and harbours Ukrainian orphans who are able to come here, and will he work with Ukraine to bring them over and make sure that these children are looked after?

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend makes a characteristically compassionate and acute point. One of the areas of greatest difficulty is helping orphans and unaccompanied children, and that is something we need to do more on, and we will.