Oral Answers to Questions

Tulip Siddiq Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. and learned Friend is absolutely right. People in mental health crisis deserve compassionate care in a safe and appropriate setting. Too often, they end up in A&E when they should be receiving specialist treatment elsewhere. This week’s announcement on mental health ambulances, crisis cafés, crisis houses and mental health urgent treatment centres will ensure that patients get the vital help that they need while easing pressures on emergency departments and freeing up staff time. He is absolutely right to highlight the issue. Our announcement will make a major difference.

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

Q6. This week, as a trustee of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, I was honoured to hear from Lia Lesser, a holocaust survivor who came to this country by herself at the age of eight because her parents believed tat the UK was a safe haven for vulnerable children. I also read the Government’s own statistics that say 200 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children were missing from hotels in the UK. Ministers have admitted that they have no idea about the whereabouts of those children. Does the Prime Minister think that the UK is still a safe haven for vulnerable children?

[The Prime Minister]

Over the last few years, the United Kingdom has opened up its hearts and homes to hundreds of thousands of people from Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine and Hong Kong and provided refuge and sanctuary to many children in that process, but the reports that we have read about are concerning. Local authorities have a statutory duty to protect all children regardless of where they go missing from, and in that situation they work closely with local agencies, including the police, to establish their whereabouts. That is why it is so important that we end the use of hotels for unaccompanied asylum seekers and reduce pressure on the overall system. That is what our plans will do.