EU Settlement Scheme

Debate between Stuart C McDonald and Steve Double

Wednesday 7th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Stuart C. McDonald]

I am not going to go down the rabbit hole the right hon. Gentleman is trying to take me down. All the indications we have had from people involved in the European Union and from other member states is that they would be perfectly happy to welcome an independent Scotland into the EU and I very much look forward to the day that that happens, but I want to get back to the subject of this debate, which is the status of EU citizens who are here today.

[Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con)]

I know the SNP wants to present this image of a hostile environment and how the settled status scheme is not working. However, the experience of actual people is completely the opposite. Only this morning I had an email from a constituent who missed the deadline for a technical reason, and my office helped get her application in. This morning she received an email from the Home Office confirming that all her rights are protected while her application is processed. The scheme is working well, and the picture the hon. Gentleman paints just is not true.

[Stuart C. McDonald]

I will come back to that, and I acknowledge there has been significant success with more than 6 million people applying for the scheme, but yesterday I met the3million which, of all organisations, is the one that knows exactly what is happening on the ground and its implications. I will come to all sorts of problems that still exist in the scheme, and the whole purpose of this debate is to try to iron out those problems and to see what we can do to fix them.

The point I was making is that tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of people are in a pretty difficult situation because of the fundamental design of this system. Whether it is tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands, it is an extraordinary, painful and awful moment.

On Thursday morning, in contrast to the hon. Gentleman, I received my first email on this subject from somebody who applied late: “My mother is quite distressed, as she needed to apply for settled status by 30 June but did not think it applied to her, maybe in denial. She needed someone to help fill out the online forms and upload the documents. The OTP”—one-time PIN—“code did not arrive on her very old phone and, as well as tech issues, she has recently applied to renew her Italian passport. My dad thinks her Italian ID card will be sufficient. I just cannot believe that someone who has been here for 50 years and is married to a UK citizen has to go through this process. Also she is very worried that her cancer drug will be withdrawn.”

I am hopeful that the situation will be resolved, in exactly the way the hon. Gentleman was able to resolve it for his constituent, but what cannot be undone is the stress, anxiety and hurt that this whole process is causing people. That is just one of hundreds of such cases that we can all expect to see in the weeks, months and even years ahead. The vast majority of people will find it appalling, because it is unnecessary.