Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Danczuk Excerpts

Wednesday 25th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, let me say to my hon. Friend and his constituent that there is nothing more heartbreaking than losing a child and we should do everything we can to help with this. The Chancellor announced in his Budget £1 million for defibrillators, including putting defibrillators into schools. I want to see a situation where community buildings, schools, pubs, village halls—all of them—have defibrillators, because we can save lives in this way, and particularly when we are saving such young lives, as in my hon. Friend’s constituent’s case, we must do better.

[Simon Danczuk (Rochdale) (Lab)]

Q4. May I start by expressing my condolences to the families of those who lost their lives in the tragic Germanwings air crash?There are not any in the Prime Minister’s constituency, there is just one in the Home Secretary’s seat, and yet there are 680 people seeking asylum in Rochdale, more than in the entire south-east of England. We are all proud of the assistance that this country offers to those in need, but public services in Rochdale are already stretched and this uneven dispersal of asylum seekers is not helping the situation. Does the Prime Minister accept that this is not fair on Rochdale, and what does he plan to do about it?

[The Prime Minister]

I think the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to raise this issue, that what we inherited was completely unacceptable. The numbers of asylum seekers are down by a third from the peak they reached under Labour. We are fast-tracking more cases and we are resolving more cases more quickly, but I have to say to him that the legislation governing the distribution of asylum seekers was put in place under the last Labour Government.

I have been following what the hon. Gentleman has been saying. He has sent some very good dispatches from the front in terms of knocking on doors in Rochdale, and this is what he says:

“Any Labour politician that says to you they knock on a door and Ed Miliband is popular are telling lies.”

He says that about his own side. He says:

“You know, this north London elite view of the world just doesn’t play in Rochdale, Rotherham, Runcorn or anywhere else beginning with an ‘R’ outside the M25.”

I would like to encourage him to do more interviews, because he could add Reading, Redditch, Redruth, Reigate, Rochford, Romford, Romsey, Rossendale, Rushcliffe, Rutland, Rye—and probably Rosyth too the way they are going.