Data Breach: ARAP Applicants in Afghanistan Debate
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Yvette Cooper
Main Page: Yvette Cooper (Labour - Pontefract, Castleford and Knottingley)Department Debates - View all Yvette Cooper's debates with the Ministry of Defence
Data Breach: ARAP Applicants in Afghanistan
Yvette Cooper Excerpts(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Wallace
In answer to the question from the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) about how we communicate one-to-one versus mass, the one-to-one communications are the place where we dispense advice, depending on their situation and geography.
Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)
I have been contacted about the harrowing case of a man who worked as a UK contractor on a UK project for many years and had a specific directed threat from a senior Taliban official. He fled his home with his family, but when his wife returned to the house to collect some belongings a few days ago, the Taliban arrived and she was shot in the head. She died a couple of days later.
The man applied twice for the ARAP scheme and has still not had a reply. Please could the Secretary of State make sure that this case is pursued? Could he also make sure that everyone who has applied gets a personal response? Will he confirm that contractors on UK projects whose families and who themselves are at mortal danger from the Taliban are eligible for the ARAP scheme?
Mr Wallace
On the criteria for the ARAP scheme, I point the right hon. Lady to the website, but what I can say generically is that contractors and the directly employed, if they come under that umbrella of the ARAP scheme, are eligible. I would be very happy to look at that case.
We assess that, despite the huge number of extra applications that have come in since we left, there are approximately 900 credible further cases of ARAP to bring forward; we are processing them at the moment, on top of the 311. We have already brought back 50 from that cohort and we will continue to bring those people out or from third countries where we find them.
The case that the right hon. Lady raises is the most worrying part. Despite the warm words of the Taliban when they started their effort to run the country, we have seen significant numbers of such incidents occurring, which only adds to my sense of sorrow about what happened today.