Child Refugee Resettlement

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 10th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary if she will make a statement on the resettlement of child refugees and the implementation of the Dubs amendment.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

As I said last night, the Government are at the forefront of assisting and protecting vulnerable children wherever they are. As the House is aware, last week the Prime Minister said that we would work with local authorities on plans to resettle unaccompanied children from France, Greece and Italy. We have said that we expect the first children to arrive before the end of the year; we have not said that it will take until the end of the year for them to arrive. As I made clear to the House, we are working hard to ensure that isolated children are reunited with family and that children at risk of exploitation and abuse come to the UK as quickly as possible, but we have to be satisfied that they will receive appropriate care and support when they arrive.

The revised Dubs amendment to the Immigration Bill obliges us to consult local authorities. We must ensure that we fulfil our obligations to children who are already in the UK, as well ensuring that we have the right support for those who may be brought to the UK from Europe. The provisions in the Bill, by their nature, mean that we have to consult others before finalising our plans, but that does not imply that we will delay getting on with this. We will be contacting council leaders in the coming days, and I have already spoken to the Local Government Association about the matter.

We have always been clear that we must do nothing that inadvertently creates a situation in which families see an advantage in sending children ahead and putting their lives at risk by attempting perilous journeys to Europe. That is why only those who were present in the EU before 20 March will be eligible for resettlement, and only when it is in their best interests to come to the UK. That will avoid creating a perverse incentive for families to entrust their children to people traffickers.

We have already started to consult relevant non-governmental organisations, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, UNICEF and member states on how best to implement the legislation. Last Friday, I met the Greek Government in Athens to discuss how we can make progress quickly. We are already working to identify those whom we can help. We have an ongoing plan with France to improve our joint response to children in Calais. We have accepted more than 30 transfer requests since February, and more than 20 have already arrived. We will work with France over the coming days and weeks to increase the identification of children in France who have family here so that we can bring them over.

In addition, the UK has played its full part in supporting European neighbours to provide support to those who have arrived. We have provided nearly £46 million of funding to the Europe-wide response to help the most vulnerable, including children and infants. In addition, the £10 million Department for International Development fund that was announced on 28 January will support the UNHCR, Save the Children and the International Rescue Committee to work with host authorities to care for and assist unaccompanied or separated children. That is on top of our Syrian resettlement programme and the children at risk resettlement scheme, which is designed to resettle up to 3,000 children at risk from the middle east and north Africa where that is deemed to be in their best interests. The Government remain committed to making a full contribution to the global refugee crisis.

We are already acting to implement the amendment. We have started discussions with local government. We have begun work with European partners and NGOs to support effective implementation, and we will bring refugee children to the UK as quickly as is safe. I am proud that the commitment of this country and this Government to help those in need, both within and outside Europe, withstands comparison with that of any other country in the world.

[Yvette Cooper]

I have asked this urgent question because, at the end of the debate last night, the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) raised the evidence that No. 10 had briefed that we would not see the first children arrive in Britain until the end of the year, which is in seven months’ time. That is in contrast with the urgency we heard from the Minister in yesterday’s debate. It is so frustrating to hear warm words and commitment, while at the same time No. 10 seems to be dragging its feet. To take the first children only by the end of the year is simply not good enough.

Let us look at the processes that should already be in place. For those who have family in the UK, the Government are processing only three to four cases a week at the moment, but more than 100 cases are pending. We need proper transparency and targets in relation to those who have family in the UK. Why will the Minister still not answer my parliamentary questions on how many applications have been made to the Home Office? Why is he still refusing to answer my freedom of information requests on how many Dublin III applications have been made? Why, if they are acting with such urgency, are the Government refusing to provide us with such information? We know that Help Refugees, Citizens UK and the Red Cross already have details of children in Europe who have family in this country who we could bring over now. UNICEF said yesterday:

“With the political will, these children could have their cases processed and be here in time to be packing their pencil cases for the new school year in September.”

Why will the Government not make a commitment at least to clear all the family cases already in the system by the time we get to the summer holidays?

As for the wider scheme, I still do not see why it will take seven months. Under pressure, the Government managed to bring in 1,000 refugees under the original Syrian refugee scheme—all tribute to them for doing so—in three months. The Canadian Government managed to take in 25,000 refugees in the space of three months. Children are at risk right now, so why will the Minister not make a commitment to accelerate the wider scheme as well? Has he even spoken to the independent schools, given that we know that 11-year-olds are still sleeping in tents in Calais on their own and 14-year-olds who want to be surgeons have been out of school for two years? Teenage boys who have been abused are at risk of being abused again, and teenage girls cannot escape from forced marriages because there is no support for them to do so. Greece and Italy do not tell the children, “Stay on the boats until we have sorted it out.” Seven months may be very fast for a bureaucrat, but it is a very long time for a child. I urge the Minister to accept the bishops’ target of taking 300 children by the beginning of the next school year. I urge him to do so.

[James Brokenshire]

I again underline what I said in my response to the right hon. Lady’s urgent question: we intend to make progress during the course of this year and the first children will therefore arrive before the end of this year, but that does not mean it will take seven months. As I think she will recognise from everything I have said last night and today, we are making quick progress in implementing the provisions in the Dubs amendment to the Immigration Bill. What the Prime Minister’s spokesperson has said is entirely consistent with what the Prime Minister said in accepting the Dubs amendment at Prime Minister’s questions last Wednesday. I want to be absolutely explicit and crystal clear in relation to that.

The right hon. Lady refers to what is happening in Calais in France. As I have already said, we are continuing to work quickly with the French Government to speed up the processes. We have already taken steps to do so in terms of the existing arrangements. Clearly, there is a renewed focus given our acceptance of the Dubs amendment to the Immigration Bill. I absolutely want to use that as a means of speeding up and making more effective the processing of those with links to family in the UK. Vulnerable children can then be reunited with their extended family in the UK, which is in their best interests, and will no longer be isolated in France, Italy or Greece.

The right hon. Lady should look at how we have approached the vulnerable persons resettlement scheme—we have got on with it. I pay tribute to the work of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Refugees. Once we have stated our commitments, we get on with the practical implementation. We are doing that already, even though the Bill has not received Royal Assent.

We will continue in the days ahead to have those discussions within Government and with all the parties involved, so that we can make progress quickly and see that children who have family here and who are in need of support because of their vulnerability to exploitation come to the UK. I need to consult properly with local authorities in the spirit and the letter of the legislation. That is what we are doing and we will get on with it.

Immigration Bill

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 9th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Burrowes]

It has been somewhat lost in the debate, but we should welcome the Government’s commitment to dispatching 45 experts to Greece to provide processing and registration. That does not make the campaign headlines, but it is of vital practical importance now. We are not turning our backs; we want to get the experts out to Greece now to improve the reception that some months ago, as my hon. Friend and her colleagues saw, was woeful. We will now be able to process those people and provide them with safety. Some of them will, no doubt, be able to come to this country in the scheme that the Government have announced, but others will be relocated to providers of children’s services across Europe, because there are existing legal commitments to children.

I welcome the Government’s commitments. I welcome the fact that the commitment made last week will, as I understand it, be aligned with the Lords amendment and will include asylum-seeking children, those who seek family reunification and children who are at risk of exploitation. We should not forget the Government’s world-leading commitment to relocate from the Syrian and north African region children who are risk. Just as we have campaigned for safe and legal routes, we must now encourage other countries to step up and join us in the scheme for children at risk. We are leading other countries in providing the international aid that will bring people to safety. Let us now get on the case of other European countries to make sure that they follow our lead across Europe and in the region.

I want briefly to mention the other matters that are the subject of consideration. In relation to Lords amendment 84, I welcome the Government’s movement on the provision of a four-month automatic bail hearing. It is distinct from Lords amendment 84 in that it provides judicial oversight not of 28 days, but of four months. In addition, the burden of proof falls on the applicant rather than the Government to justify what is excessive detention. Stephen Shaw asked, in his 60-second recommendation, what was the Government’s definition of excessive detention. One would certainly say that if detention extends to four months, it is excessive. I concede that this is part of a Government package, which includes the publication, for the first time, of an “adults at risk” policy and the introduction of removal plans. I would welcome the Government’s commitment to timings for implementing that package.

Finally, I welcome the Government’s movement on the issue of pregnant detainees. It is much more in line with the coalition Government’s proud achievement—this did not happen under a Labour Government—of outlawing the detention of children in immigration centres. That shows our practical commitment to a compassionate view of the human dignity of our most vulnerable people in detention. We need to align with that commitment, and the Government have come close to doing that. However, we still need to ask about the small word “or” in amendment (b) to Lords amendment 85C. Why does it make the distinction between

“the Secretary of State is satisfied that—

the woman will shortly be removed from the United Kingdom, or

there are exceptional circumstances which justify the detention”?

Surely, pregnant women should be detained only if there are exceptional circumstances and they can be removed shortly. Why are we distinguishing between the two? If the aim of detention is to remove people and detention should be a last resort, given the new 72-hour limit on detention, when would detention not be exceptional and removal forthcoming? It is important that the Government clarify that. The intention is to align ourselves with the children and family regime, but I am concerned that the measure leaves the door open for the excessive detention of pregnant women. Having said that, I welcome the Government’s movement in that regard, and I am sure that the end result of our deliberations will be that we show greater respect for human dignity and compassion to the most vulnerable.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I strongly welcome the Government’s huge change in principle and acceptance of the Dubs amendment. I pay tribute to Lord Dubs, Citizens UK, Save the Children, Help Refugees, the Association of Jewish Refugees, countless faith groups, 70,000 people who signed the petition and Members from all parts of the House who have argued strongly for the measure.

I welcome the spirit of the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) and the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen), and I am glad that the Government have accepted it. I was saddened by the contribution made by the hon. Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth), and I do not believe that his views are representative of those of most Conservative hon. Members. I think the hon. Gentleman’s point was that children in Europe are somehow not at risk and are safe, but we know that that is not the case: 10,000 child refugees have simply disappeared.

When the hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips) and I were in Athens last week, we went to a makeshift camp in a hockey stadium, where 1,200 people are staying in rigged-up tents and under blankets. In among them were children and teenagers with no one to look after them. The aid workers talked about the abuse, the risk of domestic violence and the cases of rape that there have been. Children need to be supported. We also met Greek Government Ministers—probably the same ones that the Minister for Immigration met last Friday—who said that they want help, particularly to resettle children quickly because they are at risk and are out of school.

By agreeing to Lords amendment 87B, we will be saying that we are prepared to do our bit. However, I urge the Minister for Immigration to move swiftly on the practicalities. I welcome the steps he has set out, but I urge him not simply to go along with the original objective of the Dubs amendment, which was to help 3,000 children—I hope he will still aim to achieve that by providing support for 3,000 child refugees—but to set a milestone by accepting the proposal put forward by UNICEF, Citizens UK and the group of bishops to help all those currently stuck in limbo in the family reunification system. In particular, we should help the nearly 150 children in Calais and the first 300 children from Italy and Greece to do our bit to speed up the process as rapidly as possible so that we can get them in place and resettled by the beginning of the school year. Some of those children have been out of school for far too long already, and we should do our bit to help. Of course, that will mean giving support to local authorities to enable them to do so.

[Stella Creasy]

My right hon. Friend is making an incredibly powerful speech. She is right to say that this amendment is supported not just by Conservative Members, but by people across the country who think we should help such child refugees. Indeed, people in my own community were so inspired by her work and that of Lord Dubs that they raised over £1,000 in five days to pay for caravans for children to stay in in refugee camps in Calais while waiting to be resettled in this country. There is clearly support for this across the country. It is right that we look at the 3,000 figure as a milestone, but I hope she agrees that we can do a lot more.

[Yvette Cooper]

I agree with my hon. Friend that there is a lot of support and interest in this amendment, and we should be drawing on that. The Government have talked about working with the LGA, but I hope that they will also work with all sorts of other organisations. For example, I had an email only this morning from an independent boarding school local to my constituency that wants to offer two free places from September for child refugees. I will pass that offer on to Ministers, who I hope will take up not only that offer, but those of about 80 places from independent boarding schools across the country, as well as others from other community groups and organisations that want to do their bit to help—from faith groups to Home for Good, which wants to work with the Government to bring forward more places—

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

rose—

[Yvette Cooper]

I will not give way because there is very little time and other Members want to speak.

Home for Good wants to involve foster parents who would be prepared to sign up and work with local authorities.

[Kelly Tolhurst]

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

[Yvette Cooper]

I will give way to the hon. Lady, who has not yet spoken.

[Kelly Tolhurst]

Will the right hon. Lady outline the conversations she has had with her local authority about the number that it is prepared to take? When Kent was in crisis last year and we asked other authorities for help, very few came forward. My question is: how many, and what has changed?

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper]

I think the hon. Lady makes an important point. In fact, among the points I was going to make was to say that the Government should not only work with local authorities—they need to make sure that local authorities have the funding—but, frankly, should not expect Kent to take more child refugees, because it has already done a huge amount and other local councils across the country need to do more. That support will need to be funded.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Refugees has done a great job in working with local authorities to make sure that funding is available for the existing programme for Syrian refugees. My local authority, Wakefield Council, has offered to take some of the families under that programme, but that offer has not yet been taken up. The council has come forward saying it is ready to help and it has offered places, but such places have not yet been forthcoming, because the Government have not yet brought them through the system.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Yvette Cooper]

I will not give way because I am conscious that other Members who have put in a huge amount of effort want to make a quick contribution.

Sir Erich Reich, the chairman of Kindertransport, the Association of Jewish Refugees, said last week:

“The echoes of the past haunt many of my fellow Kinder and I whose fate similarly rested with members of the British parliament. I feel it is incumbent on us to once again demonstrate our compassion and human-kindness to provide sanctuary to those in need.”

For us, as Members of the British Parliament today, it is a fitting echo of the past that we can stand together to support the amendment in the name of one of Sir Erich’s fellow Kinder, Lord Alf Dubs, and help a new generation of child refugees.

Immigration Bill

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 25th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I was just talking to the Under-Secretary of State for Refugees, my hon. Friend the Member for Watford (Richard Harrington), and he made it clear that that is not true. We will come forward very shortly with proposals on the issue of sponsorship, which is important and which we do want to take forward, but it is important that we get it right. That is precisely what my hon. Friend is doing as part of the vulnerable person resettlement scheme.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

The Minister’s point was effectively that the children who are alone in Greece now are Greece’s problem, but Save the Children has said that 2,000 children are alone in northern Greece and there are fewer than 500 child shelter places for them, and those are full. What does he really want those children to do when they are sleeping rough, being targeted by traffickers and smuggling gangs, and subjected to abuse? Does he really think that that is just Greece’s problem and that we should not do our bit too?

[James Brokenshire]

No, I do not. That is why it is right that we are providing financial aid and assistance in that area. I will come on to deal specifically with that support to underline the important commitment that this country is giving.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

As I think I have indicated, we are already providing support to the French Government, as the non-governmental organisation France Terre d’Asile has responsibility for identifying children in and around the camps at Calais and making sure that they go into the system so that we can do the child safeguarding, make those connections and see that they are reunited with family. That is why I underline the need to give a clear message to those who have connections to identify and support children so that they go into the French system, because we will act. I think that we have the systems and processes in place now to be able to act effectively. That is why it is important to see that operationalised, so that we are doing what we can, alongside the French Government, our Border Force officers and France Terre d’Asile, to ensure that when children are identified, they are immediately pointed to how they can get into the French system so that we can then act.

[Yvette Cooper]

rose—

[James Brokenshire]

I will give way to the right hon. Lady, as I know of her long-standing interest in this matter.

[Yvette Cooper]

I thank the Minister for giving way once again. On that point, Citizens UK has identified 157 live cases that have been put into the system, but he is saying that only 24 have in fact been accepted, and only half of those have actually made it to Britain. Why are they not all brought here straight away? Why are they still stuck in Calais, cold, living in tents in the mud and at huge risk, when he has accepted that they should be here with family who can care for them?

[James Brokenshire]

We are processing 50 cases, 24 of which we have accepted, but a number of those cases are complicated. It is a question of the safeguarding measures that need to be put in place for the children to be reunited with the families who are here. It is therefore more complex than it is sometimes presented. That is not in any way a desire on the part of the Government, or anyone else, to encourage delay. Rather, it is about the normal child safeguarding measures that I think are appropriate. I say to the right hon. Lady and to Citizens UK that if there are cases that can be linked to families here in the UK, get them into the French system. I make that point again and again, because we stand ready to act and to take charge where there are those links, and to see that if there are children in northern France who are separated from family in the UK, action is taken.

Those processes for family reunion are of course in addition to the unaccompanied asylum-seeking children who make their claims in this country. With over 3,000 asylum applications from unaccompanied children last year, I pay tribute to all those local authorities that, despite the unprecedented pressure on their services, are providing support to those young people. At the same time, we need to shut down the illegal migration routes to Europe that are exploited by human traffickers, who encourage people to risk their lives to make perilous journeys. The Government remain of the view that relocation schemes within Europe risk creating unintended consequences or perverse incentives for people to put their lives into the hands of traffickers. Instead, we are committed to providing safe and legal routes for the most vulnerable refugees to resettle in the UK.

The success of the EU-Turkey migration agreement is a vital opportunity to end the misery and lethal risk that smugglers and organised criminals are causing on a daily basis. We have made an offer of UK support to help implement the EU-Turkey migration agreement. We need to close down illegal crossings from Turkey to Greece and tackle migrant flows upstream. We are offering 75 expert personnel to help with the processing and administration of migrants in Greek reception centres, to act as interpreters, to provide medical support and to bolster our existing team assisting the Commission to ensure that there is effective and efficient co-ordination.

Those teams, which are ready to be deployed, will include experts in supporting vulnerable groups, such as unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, and those trained to tackle people trafficking. That will help to ensure that vulnerable people, including children, are identified and can access asylum and support procedures as quickly as possible. That is in addition to the work undertaken by the Anti-Slavery Commissioner, Kevin Hyland, to visit hotspots and assess what more can be done to ensure that unaccompanied children are protected from traffickers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Fuller]

It is a pleasure to follow the SNP spokesman, the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald). I shall address my comments not to the substantive area of debate, amendment 87, but to other Lords amendments. As a result, I will try to limit my contribution, given that many people wish to speak to amendment 87.

Two issues of particular importance to me are, first, amendment 84, on the time limit for immigration detention, and the Government’s proposal, and secondly, amendment 85, on the detention of pregnant women. On amendment 84, I listened carefully to the Minister earlier and to the announcements by the Home Office last week, and on balance, notwithstanding the limitations just mentioned, the combination of the changes, along with the opportunity for Stephen Shaw to review the time limit, as part of his inquiry, in 12 to 18 months, gives me comfort that the Government, though they have not gone as far as I would have wished, have done enough for me to be generally supportive of their approach and certainly not to vote against them.

Unfortunately, on the detention of pregnant women, it is a different matter. Without a doubt, this is a big and welcome change, but for me it is a matter of principle: we should never detain a pregnant woman when we have the choice not to. It was January 2012 when I asked my first question in Parliament about the detention of pregnant women. I only regret that it took me 18 months as a Member to ask those questions—that it took me 18 months to become aware of a vast estate of incarceration and detention that had built up under the last Labour Government and continued under the coalition, and was detaining people in our name for no other reason than that they came here and had not proven their case to stay. Each of those many people—not just pregnant women, but others who were victims of torture and rape, as the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) mentioned—should have had a better and more humane alternative.

To those groups such as Medical Justice, Women for Refugee Women, the Refugee Council and so many others that have tried in the intervening period to persuade the Home Office to move its policy away from the default of detention and a culture of disbelief to something that is understanding of each individual circumstance, the Government’s announcements over the last few weeks are tremendously welcome. They do not go far enough, however.

I can assure the Minister that we will hold him and the Government to account in respect of all the words he has said and all the frameworks he has put in place to ensure that the objectives of the all-party groups in their inquiry into the use of immigration detention are achieved. There is a better alternative to detention: it is called case management, and it means letting people know what their rights are and not leaving them in the community with no one to talk to for month after month. We must engage with these people so they know that they can remain in this country if they can prove their entitlement, and we must provide them with the best possible support and advice to make that case. As I said, we will hold the Minister to account for that.

The campaign had a hashtag, as is common these days; it was called #setherfree. I regret that I cannot say to the women in Yarl’s Wood today that as a result of these changes they will be free. My hope is that we have started to change the direction, and that we are starting the process of taking that valuable phrase “asylum seeker” out of the gutter where it was left, and putting it where it should be as a place of honour—not for the individual, but for the country to which they come to claim that status. This is a judgment about us as much as it is a judgment about the people who come to this country. Let us take this step forward, but let us pressure the Government to do more.

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome the speech made by the hon. Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) and pay tribute to the hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips), whose powerful speech must have been difficult to make. It was a great pleasure, too, to hear the voice of my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) back in the Chamber this evening.

I shall focus my remarks on amendment 87, proposed in the House of Lords by Lord Alf Dubs. Some 95,000 children and teenagers are alone in Europe as a result of the refugee crisis—four times more than Save the Children thought the figure was for unaccompanied child refugees. This amendment asks Britain to help only 3,000 of them; and that is all. It will not solve the problem, but it will mean we are doing our bit. That is why I think the Government are so wrong to say no. We should do our bit just as we did 70 years ago when Britain supported the Kindertransport that brought Lord Alf Dubs to Britain and saved his life. It had cross-party support at that time. Those survivors of the Kindertransport are asking us to help child refugees again today.

The reason why this amendment is needed is that there are so many children who are disappearing, suffering and dying on our continent today, and other countries do not have the capacity to cope with that alone. This House has the power in its hands to vote for this amendment today.

We should be clear that we all support what the Government have done in providing aid for the region. We all support the 0.7% of GDP that goes in aid, and we also support how much has been done to help the areas affected by the Syrian refugee crisis in particular. We know, too, however, that aid in the regions is not enough, particularly when people are fleeing and need sanctuary, and it is not enough when we need to help children. The lone child and teenage refugees are hugely vulnerable. Thousands are sleeping rough in Europe tonight because there are simply not the places, the sanctuaries and the children’s centres that we need to give them shelter.

[Tom Elliott]

The right hon. Lady makes an important point about the number of refugees and the number of young people who are in Europe. The figure of 26,000 has been mentioned several times. I would be interested to know how the figure of 3,000 came about. Is there an explanation for that, and what criteria will be used to bring the 3,000 children here?

[Yvette Cooper]

The 3,000 figure was proposed by Save the Children, at a time when it thought that 26,000 children in Europe were alone. We now know that the figure is much higher, and that 95,000 children are alone and at risk across Europe. It would be for the Government to work with agencies such as Save the Children to establish the criteria; I think that priority should be given to those with families in Britain who can care for them, but that is something that we can debate.

It is right for us to do our bit to help. Children are sleeping rough tonight because countries across Europe simply do not have the capacity to provide that help. According to UNICEF and Save the Children, 2,000 children are alone in northern Greece, but there are fewer than 500 places for them, and those places are full. In Italy, the agencies found that girls were being exploited by older men, and that half the boys already had sexually transmitted diseases. In Calais, I met 11 and 12-year-olds who were suffering from scabies and bronchitis, and who were sleeping in tents with adult men.

This is the challenge that Europe faces: teenage girls being trafficked into prostitution, teenage boys being abused and raped, children with hypothermia and pneumonia, children who are traumatised because they have lost family along the way, and children who are locked up in detention centres because there are no other places for them to go to—again, often alongside adult men. A Syrian teenager who came to Parliament last week to meet Alf Dubs told me that he had fled the violence and fighting to reach family members who were here in Britain, but the abuse and the suffering that he saw and experienced as a refugee alone in Europe were worse than the violence that he had left behind.

[Andy Slaughter]

As always, my right hon. Friend is speaking passionately. I was at that meeting, and the eyewitness accounts were extremely telling.

Is this not the problem that the Government have tonight? They say that the developed countries of Europe should be able to deal better with refugees, but, as my right hon. Friend has pointed out, those countries are not dealing with it. The fact on the ground, in Calais and in Greece, is that children are at risk and are being brutalised and tormented, in some cases—to their shame—by the authorities who should be looking after them. That, surely, is why we have to do our bit.

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is exactly right. Let me make my position clear. I think that other countries should be doing more—I think that it is shocking how little child protection the French authorities have put in place around Calais, and that we need countries across Europe to do far more—but how can we urge them to do more if we are refusing to do anything to help and give sanctuary to those child refugees?

[James Brokenshire]

The right hon. Lady is making an important point about family reunification. Does she accept that the £10 million fund that we are providing through the Department for International Development is intended to help Save the Children and others to support the very thing that I think she is rightly calling for—stronger family reunification, whether in the United Kingdom or in Europe more generally—and that the UK is playing an important part in that respect?

[Yvette Cooper]

The Minister is right to say that we should be supporting family reunion, but, as I said to him in an intervention, that is simply not working in Calais. He and his Department cannot even tell me how many “take charge” requests the Home Office has received. We know that only a dozen of the children from Calais have actually arrived in the first place. [Interruption.] The Minister says that it is 24 now. He has already said that 24 children have been accepted for transfer, but only half of those children have actually arrived in Britain, because the process is simply taking too long.

The Minister is, of course, right to say that we should be trying to assist family reunion from Italy and Greece, but the £10 million that he has announced is funding for charities. It is true that charities can do great work, and they are already doing important work in Calais to help children there. Ultimately, however, it is not enough to ask charities to help if the French and British Governments are refusing to do their bit to speed up the system and provide the legal sanctuary that those children need, and the same applies to the children in Italy and Greece.

Although charities can do great work, they cannot provide the necessary authorities, the legal foster care, the statutory children’s homes, and the statutory child protection. It is Governments who need to do that: the Government in Greece, the Government in Italy, the Government in France, and the Government here in Britain, who should also be doing their bit.

[James Brokenshire]

This is the last time I shall intervene on the right hon. Lady; I do not want to interrupt her flow. On that last point, does she accept that the Government’s offer to put 75 extra people on the ground in Greece, including specialists with the ability to support the Greek Government, demonstrates the fact that the UK Government are playing their role in supporting Greece to do the things that she is calling for?

[Yvette Cooper]

The Minister knows that I have welcomed many of the things that he has announced at every stage. I welcomed the announcement that the Government made in January, for example, just as I welcomed its re-announcement this week. It is sad that, at each stage, they have had to be pressurised into making those announcements, but I welcome them nevertheless. However, the International Rescue Committee and other agencies are saying that the lack of sufficient staff in Greece and Italy means that there are hugely long delays in processing the cases. With regard to the idea that those 75 people are going to make all the difference, that is still not an alternative to Britain doing its bit to provide sanctuary as well.

The UNHCR reports that there have been instances of

“children engaging in survival sex to pay smugglers to continue their journey, either because they have run out money, or because they have been robbed”.

Europol has warned that children, young women and lone refugees are being targeted for exploitation because there is not sufficient protection when they arrive, and that 10,000 child and teenage refugees have disappeared, often into the arms of criminal gangs. This is modern slavery of the kind that the whole House united to condemn just 12 months ago when we passed the new legislation. It is the same modern slavery that the Home Secretary described as being

“an affront to the dignity and humanity of every one of us”.

The House has the chance today to protect the dignity and humanity of 3,000 children and to stop them falling into modern slavery in Europe, so why is the Home Office still refusing to act?

I want to deal with the Minister’s points in turn. First, he says that we are doing our bit by helping children and families in the middle east and north Africa instead. I welcome what we are doing there. As I understand it, the figure of 3,000 will involve children and families, and not simply children alone, because as a result of UNICEF’s advice, the Government have broadened the scope to include children and families. However, this is not an either/or. Just because we are protecting and helping some of those from outside Europe does not mean that we cannot do our bit to help those in Europe as well. Some of the children who are in the detention centres in Greece and the tents in Calais and who are sleeping rough on the streets of Naples now face risks that are greater than those they faced when they were closer to home.

Secondly, the Minister said earlier that this was effectively a matter for the other European countries where the children are right now. The problem is, however, that Italy and Greece are overwhelmed. Germany and Sweden have done much to take in unaccompanied children, but they are struggling to find guardians or places in children’s homes and hostels for more. If we want other countries to do more, we also have to be prepared to do our bit. Of course it is not easy. There would have to be proper support, protection and safeguarding, and robust checks would also be needed. Some of the children and teenagers will have profound and complex needs as a result of the trauma and abuse that they have experienced.

It would also be wrong simply to leave this to Kent to cope with alone. I have had local councils and councillors from right across the country contacting me to say that they want to do more to help. I have heard from organisations such as Home for Good, which represents foster families who want to do more to help, as well as from community groups and faith organisations across the country who think that we should act. We especially have a responsibility to those who have family here. I have raised with the Minister my concerns about the failure to apply the Dublin agreement to Calais and about the number of children who are still stuck in the cold and the mud there; 157 cases have been identified by Citizens UK, yet so few have actually come to Britain. We have been raising that with Ministers over many months.

The Minister pointed out the need to do proper safeguarding checks and assessments and to investigate the families that reside here. He is of course right that safeguarding is necessary, but why is he not thinking about safeguarding them in Calais? They are there right now, in tents, at risk of huge abuse, at risk of gangs, at risk of trafficking, and at risk of taking crazy risks, because that is what teenagers do. Lives have been lost as a result. In January, a 15-year-old was killed in the back of a lorry in Dunkirk. His sister lives in west London. In March, a 17-year-old was killed in the wheel arch of a lorry in Oxfordshire. His uncles lives in Manchester. In April, a seven-year-old nearly suffocated in a lorry in Leicester. That he did not was only because an aid worker in Calais had given him a mobile phone and he was able to send a text message saying that he did not have any oxygen. The aid worker was able to alert the police, and they traced him and his older brother, who would otherwise have suffocated in a lorry. No matter how many times the Minister tells us that it is, the system is not working. He also claims that we are providing support to charities and financial support to the region, but it is not enough. It is not an alternative to Governments acting and providing legal help.

The Minister said that if we take child refugees from Europe, that will encourage more to come, but that argument is deeply wrong. Few of the child refugees in Europe have come because they want to travel to Britain. Many are trying to reach family, which will not change whether or not we take more child refugees. Many are just trying to find somewhere safe anywhere in Europe and that will not change either. Frankly, many do not know where they are going or what they are doing. They may have been trafficked or separated from family along the way.

Action on smugglers, border checks, working with Turkey, a strategy for Libya, or providing alternative safe and legal routes—all of those things may make a difference in preventing people from making a perilous journey in the first place. However, whether Britain takes 3,000 of the 95,000 children who are already in Europe simply will not make a difference to the number who try to come. These children have arrived, they are already here, and they need sanctuary and support. The danger is that the Government are actually saying that it is better to leave them to face those risks and that we should be prepared to abandon thousands of children to a life of exploitation, prostitution and abuse, because that somehow might prevent other children from getting on a boat. That is immoral, because they are children and not only should they have shelter, but they should be in school, where many of them have not been for years. Many of the refugees are a similar age to my children, who are in school and doing exams. It is an age at which children need support and help, not to be turned away.

When the Kindertransport legislation was passed in Parliament, MPs of all parties supported Britain’s leadership in helping child refugees. Alongside Alf Dubs, other Kindertransport survivors, such as Rabbi Harry Jacobi, who came across on one of the last boats out of Amsterdam, and Sir Erich Reich, have spoken out to urge us to do more now. All of them have joined with the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Church of England, the House of Lords, Save the Children, the Refugee Council, Citizens UK, the Jewish Council for Racial Equality, local government, community groups and faith groups to urge MPs to do the right thing today. We are rightly proud of what the Kindertransport did and of the cross-party support in Parliament, but will today’s vote on child refugees be a similar source of pride for future generations or a source of shame?

We rightly commemorate the Kindertransport and the life of Sir Nicholas Winton, who rescued hundreds of Jewish child refugees. His picture is now on the Royal Mail’s first-class stamp. When it was launched, the Home Secretary called him

“an enduring example of the difference that good people can make even in the darkest of times.”

She called him a hero of the 20th century. He was. We need heroes for the 21st century, too. It is no good just congratulating ourselves on Britain’s past if we are not prepared to show the same support and sanctuary today. It is no good telling children the parable of the goodand be disappointed about how we voted today. Let us all, from all parts of this House, stand together and support the Dubs amendment.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Unaccompanied Children

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) on securing the important debate. When he started his speech he made some cracks about needing a long-term plan, and I want to talk about time, because one of the problems with the immigration system is that it does not recognise how important timeliness is in a child’s life. A week, a month or a year in a child’s life, in comparison with an adult’s, is an enormous amount of time. One of the problems is the lack of timely intervention and support for vulnerable children, in France and also when they are in the UK.

In the case of ZAT et ors in the immigration tribunal, the judgment said:

“Insufficient and inappropriate reception conditions for unaccompanied asylum seeking children”—

in France—

“were considered to impair their effective access to the asylum procedure”.

We also learned that the children in that case were not eligible for legal aid, and that there was an endlessly bureaucratic process for their cases even to begin. I hear about Home Office officials being sent to France to help sort out those things but I do not see the speeding up of individual applications as a result, so that is the first step we should take.

The second step is trying to help local authorities that are acting on the issue. A number of Members have spoken about the situation in Kent. I attended a presentation by Philip Segurola from Kent and, strikingly, in September last year, instead of the usual 20 or so individual unaccompanied children more than 200 arrived there in a single month. We need to support local authorities better to support unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

Beyond that, we know that child advocates work—the mixed results claim about the advocacy trial is spin. The independent University of Bedfordshire analysis of the outcomes of the trial was overwhelmingly positive. It showed that children experienced someone being on their side. That is the most essential thing. With overburdened social workers, children do not have an experience of anyone being on their side in the labyrinthine bureaucracy of asylum seeking, and it is urgent that we ensure that every child at risk of trafficking or who has been trafficked, and also asylum-seeking children, get access to an advocate who can be on their side. Although it is true that some of those children went missing, in almost every case in the trial it was before they were allocated an advocate. A number of the case studies in the Bedfordshire report showed that it was the child advocate who found a child who had gone missing. That is the second area where we need to act urgently.

Thirdly, we need to change a procedure that has existed for decades. When a child applies for asylum, the Home Office does nothing—it does not take action; it does not investigate the claim; it waits until just before the child’s 18th birthday to take any action in relation to the claim. The process was described by the Home Affairs Committee as serving

“administrative convenience more than the best interests of children”,

and that is right.

I understand that it is difficult for a child to make a compelling case for asylum, but the state has a responsibility, at an early stage, to investigate the nature of the claim because three, four or five years later it is difficult to be able to support such a child. We are in a situation where children are failing to be supported in Europe, all over the place. In Lesbos they are being fed by sandwiches being thrown over a fence. That is unacceptable, and we should not be part of it.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point about not knowing the full situation and about a number of children disappearing. In light of that, I have put parliamentary questions to the Minister about the number of take charge requests that have come to the British Government and I have been told that they cannot provide that information. It really troubles me that we do not have the information on which to even make the decisions. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is a huge problem? How can the Government reassure us if they do not even have the facts?

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Indeed, and it is not only the UK that does not have the facts; strikingly, many Administrations all over Europe, including in countries we admire for being bureaucratically effective, such as Germany, do not have the statistics. We really are not looking after children. The state is the parent in those circumstances and, frankly, we are the kind of parent who, if we were a human being, should be facing court for failure to adequately parent. That is not acceptable, and action is needed urgently.

Child Refugees: Calais

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 29th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary to make a statement on child refugees in Calais.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Last Thursday, a judge in France ruled that the authorities in Calais could proceed with clearing the tents and makeshift accommodation from the southern section of the migrant camp located there. Over recent weeks the authorities, working with non-governmental organisations, have ensured that the migrants affected by the clearances, which have begun today, were aware of the alternative accommodation that the French state had made available. For women and children, that means the specialist accommodation for about 400 people in and around the Jules Ferry centre, or the protected accommodation elsewhere in the region. For others, this means the recently erected heated containers that can house 1,500 people.

The French Government have also, with the support of UK funding, established more than 100 welcome centres elsewhere in France where migrants in Calais can find a bed, meals and information about their options. To be clear, no individual needs to remain in the camps in Calais and Dunkirk. The decision to clear part of the camp in Calais is of course a matter for the French Government. The joint declaration signed in August last year committed the UK and France to a package of work to improve physical security at the ports, to co-ordinate the law enforcement response, to tackle the criminal gangs involved in people smuggling and to reduce the number of migrants in Calais.

Both Governments retain a strong focus on protecting those vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation, and have put in place a programme to identify and help potential victims in the camps around Calais. The UK is playing a leading role in tackling people smuggling, increasing joint intelligence work with the French to target the callous gangs that exploit human beings for their own gain.

The UK shares the French Government’s objective of increasing the number of individuals who take up the offer of safe and fully equipped accommodation away from Calais so that they can engage with the French immigration system, including by lodging an asylum claim. It is important to stress that anyone who does not want to live in the makeshift camps in Calais has the option of engaging with the French authorities, who will provide accommodation and support. That is particularly important for unaccompanied children. When an asylum claim is lodged by a child with close family connections in the UK, both Governments are committed to ensuring that such a case is prioritised, but it is vital that the child engages with the French authorities as quickly as possible. That is the best way to ensure that these vulnerable children receive the protection and support they need and the quickest way to reunite them with any close family members in the UK.

The UK is committed to safeguarding the welfare of unaccompanied children and we take our responsibilities seriously. No one should live in the conditions we have seen in the camps around Calais. The French Government have made huge efforts to provide suitable, alternative accommodation for all those who need it, and have made it clear that migrants in Calais in need of protection should claim asylum in France.

[Yvette Cooper]

This morning the French authorities started to move people out of the southern part of the Calais refugee camp, in theory into container shelters and reception centres elsewhere. The charities say that there is not enough alternative accommodation and around 2,300 people have nowhere to go. That includes many from Syria and Afghanistan, and over 400 children and teenagers with no one to look after them, such as the 12-year-old boy I met from Afghanistan with a huge scar across his face, which had happened when his home was attacked.

Unaccompanied children are not allowed into the new container shelters and the Jules Ferry centre for women and children is full. The tents and volunteer support network are about to be bulldozed and there is no safeguarding plan in place at all. There is a massive reality gap between what the Minister said and what is happening on the ground. Save the Children warns that things are extremely chaotic and this is making

“an appalling situation for children even worse.”

This is dangerous. The Minister well knows that there is a serious risk that those children will now just disappear into the hands of traffickers, criminal gangs or prostitution—another 400 children on top of the 10,000 who Europol says have already disappeared in Europe.

Some of those children have their closest family here in the UK. Citizens UK estimates that there are up to 150 such children. That is why they are there, rather than heading to Germany or Sweden, and the Government say they agree that child refugees should be reunited with their family. They also agree that if their closest family is in the UK, they should be able to apply here for asylum, and have promised funding to help that happen. A court case confirms that relatives in Britain should be able to look after children while they apply, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has offered to process cases and speed things up, but that is not happening for the kids in Calais. Even if they manage to apply, their cases are taking nine months. They do not have nine months—their remaining tents are being bulldozed now.

So will the Minister make urgent representations to the French Government to provide immediate safeguarding support for children and young people, and not to remove their accommodation until there is somewhere safer for them to go? Will he accept the offer from the UNHCR to help process applications and set up a fast system to reunite children with family who are here? Finally, will he agree to Lord Dubs’ amendment to help child refugees?

The Minister has talked a good game on stopping trafficking and modern slavery, and he is right to be appalled at the criminal gangs, but this is where it gets real. The Minister has the power now to stop the trafficking of hundreds of children on our doorstop. Will he do it?

[James Brokenshire]

We do take our responsibilities seriously, as I indicated in the statement that I made to the House. On the level of alternative accommodation, I mentioned the welcome centres that are available around other parts of France, which now number more than 100. Around 2,500 people have left those camps to go to the reception centres. I stress the importance of getting asylum claims into the system in France.

The right hon. Lady highlights, rightly, the interests of children in and around the camps. We are obviously aware of the containerised accommodation adjacent to the Calais camp. Priority, we understand, is being given to women, children and other vulnerable migrants. This is in addition to the 400 places in heated tents already available for women and children.

In response to the right hon. Lady’s point about close family members, I can tell her that we remain committed to our obligations under Dublin III. The UK and France are running a joint communication centre at the camp, which informs individuals of their rights to claim asylum in France and gives them information on family reunification.

Equally, to assist in the handling of such cases, the UK and France have established a senior-level standing committee and agreed single points of contact with respective Dublin units, and the UK is about to second an asylum expert to the French administration to facilitate the improvement of all stages of the process of identifying, protecting and transferring any relevant cases to the UK.

The right hon. Lady referred to a period of nine months, but it should take nowhere near that amount of time. We remain committed to seeing an efficient and effective process for what we judge to be a small number of cases that might have that direct connection to the UK. She will also be aware of the broader family reunification provisions, over and above Dublin, that would allow children to be reunited with their parents, with direct applications not only from France, but from elsewhere in Europe and, indeed, from the region, where there is that direct link. The Government have also committed an additional £10 million through the Department for International Development to support better reunification and to assist children in transit in Europe, but we are very cautious not to make an already difficult situation even worse.

Therefore, the emphasis is on giving practical support to the French Government, who are leading in this regard, and providing expert support. Equally, there is the support that we are giving in Greece, Italy and countries in the region so that such children are more easily identified and helped at the earliest opportunity.

Child Refugees in Europe

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 25th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary to make a statement on child refugees in Europe.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

The Government are at the forefront of the international response to the unprecedented migration flows into and across Europe. We want to stop the perilous journeys that are being made by migrants, including children, which have had such terrible consequences.

In respect of the majority of refugees of all ages, the clear advice from experts on the ground is that protection in safe countries in their region of origin is the best way of keeping them safe and, crucially, allowing them to return home and rebuild their lives once the conflict is over. That is why we are providing more than £1.1 billion in humanitarian aid for the Syria crisis, but it is also why we have a resettlement scheme for the most vulnerable Syrian refugees—those in the most need. Some 1,000 arrived before Christmas, about half of them children. A further 19,000 will be resettled by the end of this Parliament, and many of those will be children too.

Our resettlement scheme is based on referrals from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. We already consider referrals of separated children or orphans under the Syrian resettlement scheme where the UNHCR assesses that resettlement is in the best interests of the child. The UNHCR has a clear view that it is generally better for separated children and orphans within the region to stay there, as they are more likely to be reunited with family members or to be taken into extended family networks.

Last week the International Development Secretary announced an additional £30 million for shelter, warm clothes, hot food and medical supplies, including for 27,000 children and babies. This assistance will be distributed to aid agencies, including UNICEF, the UNHCR, the Red Cross and the International Organisation for Migration, to support vulnerable people, including children on the move or stranded in Europe or in the Balkans.

We have heard calls for the UK to take more unaccompanied children from within the EU. The Prime Minister has committed to looking again at this issue, and it is currently under review. Such a serious issue potentially affecting the lives of so many must be considered thoroughly, and no decisions have yet been taken. The Government are clear that any action to help and assist unaccompanied minors must be in the best interests of the child, and it is right that that is our primary concern. We take our responsibilities seriously, and this issue is under careful consideration. When this work is completed, we will update the House accordingly. I commend this statement to the House.

[Yvette Cooper]

The aid for refugees, particularly children, is of course welcome, but Save the Children has estimated that 26,000 children have arrived alone in Europe: some who fled alone; some who have been trafficked by gangs, perhaps into prostitution, slavery or the drugs trade; and some separated from parents or family along the way, such as the 10-year-old whose case I heard of who was separated from his parents as a gang pushed them on to a lorry, and they now do not know where he is.

The Government have said repeatedly that they are looking at the call from across parties and from Save the Children for Britain to take 3,000 lone child refugees, but there has still been no answer, and we hear rumours that they will look only at helping child refugees from camps in the region. That is not enough. In Greece, in Italy and in the Balkans, the reception centres and children’s homes are full, and children are disappearing. The Italian authorities estimate that about 4,000 children who were alone in Italy disappeared last year. I met 11 and 12-year-olds in Calais who were there alone with just one British volunteer looking after them. That is a similar age to my children, and they should not be there alone.

We should especially be helping those who have family in Britain who are desperate to care for them. Last week, a tribunal ruled that three teenagers and a vulnerable adult should be able to stay with close relatives here while their asylum cases are heard rather than being alone in France because the French system and the Dublin III agreement are not working for lone refugee children. May I urge the Minister to see this judgment as another reason to reform the system so that it helps child refugees? One case that was due to go to the tribunal was unsuccessful—that of a teenager from Afghanistan whose sister lives here. It was unsuccessful because he died, suffocated in a lorry just a few weeks ago, taking crazy risks: because he did not wait for the lawyers; because he was 15 years old and that is what teenagers do.

This week, many of us will sign the Holocaust Memorial Day book of commitment. Our colleague in the House of Lords, Lord Alf Dubs, was saved from the holocaust by the Kindertransport many generations ago. Now he is asking us, through his Lords amendment, to back Save the Children’s campaign to help a new generation of vulnerable children. Please will the Government agree to this before more children disappear or die? Please let us do our bit again to help child refugees.

[James Brokenshire]

I say to the right hon. Lady that this Government are taking a number of steps to assist child refugees both in the region and, with some of the specialist support we are providing to process asylum claims, in countries such as Greece and Italy. Indeed, looking at the situation in Calais and northern France, the support the Government are providing to the French in identifying those who are victims of slavery and trafficking is a key part of the agreement reached last August between the Home Secretary and Bernard Cazeneuve, the French Minister of the Interior.

It is important to acknowledge the right hon. Lady’s point about the role of trafficking and of those seeking to sell false hope who are very directly putting lives at risk. The way in which traffickers seek to place refugees in appalling conditions—literally not caring whether they live in die—is quite horrific. In that context, it is notable that work by Europol indicates that about 90% of those coming to Europe have been trafficked in some form or other by those involved in organised immigration crime. That is why the work we are doing in setting up the organised immigration crime taskforce is so important in working with Europol to confront and combat the heinous acts of the traffickers.

On the issue of reunion, the Dublin arrangements are in place. The right hon. Lady mentioned the court case last week, which was specific to the four individuals concerned. Although we will look at the judgment, which has not yet been received, to understand the court’s decisions and the reasons it has set out for the order it made last week, it is important to recognise that a claim of asylum still had to be made in France to ensure, as we understand it, that the reunification arrangements were operative under the Dublin arrangements. We will wait to see the judgment.

On the Save the Children report and its request for us to consider taking the 3,000 children, I have already said—the Prime Minister said the same in the House a short while ago—that we are actively considering the proposal. We will obviously return to the House when we have investigated and concluded our consideration of that matter.

Poppi Worthington

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 20th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

Astonishingly, my hon. Friend managed to forget the Department for Education. The Education Secretary chairs the child protection implementation taskforce, of which I and other Ministers are members. That cross-department team considers how we implement what we have learned from other examples of child abuse, and what we have learned from this case will give us more information and help us to develop better ways to protect children.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

This is clearly a disturbing case, and I understand the Minister’s reticence in not wanting to do anything that could prejudice justice. She will also have had only limited time in which to pursue it. May I urge her to keep pursuing this case, and not to be deterred by the process that is taking place? Will she clarify the situation regarding the police investigation? Surely we do not need to wait for the inquest for a police investigation to continue. As I understand it, the IPCC is verifying whether the police did the right job previously, and we need a police investigation now into this individual case. Could that be done by an alternative police force?

[Karen Bradley]

I know that the right hon. Lady has campaigned on these matters for many years, and I assure her that I personally will take this case and ensure that we get to the bottom of it. We must learn all the lessons from it, and understand what happened and what went wrong. We owe that to Poppi Worthington and to all other children in that situation. Specifically on the police investigation, she will be aware that we need new evidence before a new investigation can be held, so perhaps I may write to her and provide more information about the case as I receive it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

An officials group meeting took place just before Christmas to give effect to the Khartoum process, and, as a consequence, various actions have been agreed to maintain the momentum.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

The Home Secretary said earlier that she had extended the vulnerable persons scheme to help those who were at risk of being trafficked. On that basis, will she ensure that it is extended further to help vulnerable children, who are at more risk of trafficking and exploitation than anyone else and who are alone and abandoned in Europe? Masud, whom she heard about earlier, suffocated to death in the back of a lorry.

[Mrs May]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her question, which gives me an opportunity to clarify what I said earlier. I apologise if the way in which I put it gave the wrong impression. I said that we had extended the criteria of vulnerability that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was using to determine who should be resettled under our Syrian refugees resettlement scheme. However, we have also, separately, offered extra support to the French authorities in relation to the identification in the camps of those who have been trafficked.

Counter-terrorism

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am not aware of any figures that show overall what proportion of jihadists have previously been allied to another faith and have converted to Islam. It is certainly the case that there have been reports in the press, obviously recently but also previously, of individuals who have converted to Islam. A lot of work has been done and continues to be done on this whole question of how people are triggered into radicalisation and terrorist activity. In most cases, a number of factors come together that lead to an individual becoming radicalised, potentially to the point of undertaking violence. What we do with our counter-radicalisation programmes, particularly with Prevent and Channel, is aim to interrupt that process and stop people who have started down that route to radicalisation.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I am asking not about the vile video that the Home Secretary has rightly condemned, but about Siddhartha Dhar and the factual questions that have been raised. Will she tell the House when she was told that he had absconded, whether she asked for an inquiry and also whether the Home Office holds figures on the number of people who abscond while on police bail for terrorist offences?

[Mrs May]

I said that I would not speak about the individual who has been named in the press. I apologise to the shadow Home Secretary, because he did ask me about the number of people who have absconded while on police bail for terrorist offences. Those figures are not collected. Figures are collected for the number of people who are convicted of failing to surrender to bail, but those are not separated into those who have undertaken terrorist offences.

Immigration Bill

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 1st December 2015 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I recognise the manner in which the hon. Lady advances her point, but our judgment is that the policy strikes the right balance. Our family resettlement policy has rules, but equally, certain circumstances—for example, where there are older relatives, or issues relating to illness or medical need—allow for some greater flexibility within those existing rules. From our standpoint, the steps we are taking on resettlement are about an assessment of vulnerability. That is redolent of the approach we are taking in the camps, through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and how we are seeking to deal with resettlement.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

rose—

[James Brokenshire]

I am delighted to give way to the right hon. Lady, who tabled new clause 1.

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper]

May I press the Minister on the people who are currently excluded by the rules? For example, a case has been raised with me about a family of refugees from Syria. The parents are in this country with their younger children, but their 19-year-old daughter is still in Lebanon. She is unable to join them, even though she is also a refugee from Syria, because she is over 18, which is surely wrong. As a result, they are worried that they may have to pay people smugglers and traffickers to get her to Britain, which is a huge risk and would mean breaking the law.

[James Brokenshire]

As the right hon. Lady knows, the current regulations are framed in a way that allows the resettlement of children under the age of 18. Our judgment is that that is framed in the right way. Adults seeking protection can use the normal route of claiming asylum in other countries. We do not think that resettlement should be extended beyond the current framework. As I have said, there are exceptions to that, particularly in cases of older relatives who have an illness. The rules can operate in a way that allows entry clearance officers to take such factors into account. Clearly, the rules are examined case by case, including by looking at whether leave falling outside the rules may be appropriate in certain circumstances.

[Yvette Cooper]

What is the option for that 19-year-old and so many other similar cases? Where does she go—should she get a boat across to Greece and try to apply there? The Dublin III arrangements are not working for people arriving in Greece and Italy. There are huge numbers of examples of that. What does the Minister say to that 19-year-old?

[James Brokenshire]

We think that the Dublin arrangements are the right way to provide consistency of approach across the whole EU in dealing with what some have described as asylum shopping and with people’s ability to choose the jurisdiction in which they claim asylum. The key element is that we achieve a stable Syria, so that the people in those camps can see a stable future in which they will be supported there. Our response in relation to humanitarian protection, including the £1.1 billion that the Government have committed, absolutely matters. It is not simply about direct humanitarian protection; it is about education, about giving people a sense of hope and purpose and about ending up with a stable Syria to which people will be able to return as soon as possible.

--- Later in debate ---

We cannot be complacent about the situation we are in at the moment. We have record levels of net migration, far in excess of what the Government pledged in the Conservative party manifesto. We have record numbers of people who are in our country illegally and of people in this country about whom we know nothing. We have a golden opportunity in this Bill to rectify some of those lacunae in our law and to set out a framework within which we can operate in the future and thereby minimise the number of people who are in this country illegally and in breach of our immigration rules.

[Yvette Cooper]

I wish to speak to new clauses 1 and 11, which focus on the response that we should have to the refugee crisis and the way in which the family reunion rules for refugees are simply not working. The background to this is that the European refugee crisis is showing no signs of easing. Nearly 1 million refugees have travelled to our continent this year. Some 700,000 people have travelled through Greece and, in the final weeks of November, almost 3,000 people were arriving on the tiny island of Lesbos by boat each day—this is even in the November cold. A huge number of refugees are stuck in the Balkans, often in very difficult and increasingly harsh weather conditions; there are refugees camps in Idomeni, on the Greek border, and thousands more refugees are in Serbia, including unaccompanied children. Other countries in Europe are doing considerably more than us, and I continually urge the Government to do more, as we need to do our bit to support the refugees. I am talking about those not just in the camps in the regions, but those who have fled to Europe.

Tomorrow the Prime Minister will argue that Britain should not stand back and let other countries shoulder the entire security burden that stems from the events in Syria. That will be a powerful point for him to make, but what follows from that is the fact that we should not stand back and allow other countries to shoulder so much more of the burden of responding to the refugee crisis, especially as we are not doing enough to help.

This year, Britain will take just 1,000 refugees from Syria, and yet 3,000 arrive each day in Lesbos. I was struck by what the Minister said about asylum shopping. Given that we had only 25,000 asylum seekers in Britain last year, compared with 700,000 in Germany, how can he seriously talk about asylum shopping? In fact, what we are talking about are families who have been split up by a terrible refugee crisis and who simply want to be together. Families have been ripped apart by a bloody and brutal civil war in Syria. Parents have been torn apart from their children and brothers apart from their sisters.

I have met Syrian children on their own in refugee camps. There are 11 and 12-year-olds desperate to be reunited with their families. Our current rules make it very hard to reunite families of refugees who have been split up by the crisis. The British Red Cross is currently supporting an Iraqi refugee who hopes to be reunited with his wife and two daughters, one of whom is disabled and has the mental age of a seven-year-old. She is entirely dependent on her mother, but she is over 18 and so is not eligible to come to the UK under the Minister’s family reunion rules for refugees. She is stuck in Iraq, and the strain of being a sole carer is taking its toll on her mother.

Another case of the Red Cross is that of a 15-year-old boy whose parents have both been killed in the war and whose brother has been granted refugee status in the UK. He has not registered an asylum claim anywhere in Europe, but has had his fingerprints taken in Greece. Understandably, his brother wants him to join him in the UK, but he is currently not eligible and has been told to return to Greece where he knows no one and has no prospects. He is now in Italy, but is getting no support from the state and is living with another Syrian family. His brother is incredibly worried about his safety, as he feels that he is at risk of being exploited by gangs of traffickers, which, as we know, is what happens to many unaccompanied refugee children.

When I was in Calais a few weeks ago, I met a single mother with two small children. She thought that her husband had been killed in an Assad jail. The family were living in a small caravan and tents in the mud in Calais. They had left Syria and been financially supported for a while by her father-in-law, but he can now no longer afford to support them. She told me that her own father and brother were here in Britain, and that was why she had paid money to people traffickers to travel across Europe to try to join them, as they were her only remaining family. She said that they could support her here in Britain. [Interruption.] The Minister says what about Dublin. What a good point. What about Dublin III, because, in so many cases, Dublin III should help to reunite families, but it does not do that? It is not working,

Quite a few people I talked to in Calais probably would have a case under the Dublin III arrangement, but there was no process for them to apply to. Those who had looked at it were told that the French procedures and the bureaucracy would not allow it and that it was too difficult. This is why new clause 11 is so important. It urges the Minister to look at the way in which Dublin III is being implemented across Europe. Clearly, there is a huge problem here, and it could be what is driving some of the illegal migration. It could also be driving people to take huge risks at Calais. Why are they trying so desperately hard to get to Britain? Why are they not going to Germany, Sweden or other countries? Many of them told me that it was because they had family in Britain, and they were people who ought to have refugee status. Their claims were not being assessed so they were taking huge risks, causing security risks for the Eurotunnel trains and causing great problems. They were stuck in the mud in the cold winter of northern France. Much of this is to do with what France and other countries need to do, but I urge the Minister to review Dublin III. It is just not working in practice for too many of the refugees who are fleeing terrible conflict.

When many refugee families have been hit by crisis, persecution or war, they may lose their closest family members. They may no longer have the parent or the child that current family reunion rules cover. Their nearest relative may now be a brother or sister or someone who is not covered by the existing rules. That is why it is so important to look at the wider family relationships of refugees.

My intention in drawing up new clause 1 was to make it easier to reunite refugee families and to help refugees whose closest family are already refugees here in Britain to get sanctuary here too. That would cover the case of the 19-year-old in Beirut that I raised with the Minister, and the woman whose disabled child is over 18 but still needs her parents. It is not my objective to rewrite the wider immigration rules for those who are not refugees; that is a different debate. I want to concentrate on those who are refugees. I recognise that new clause 1 is not the simplest way to do this because it is primary legislation when the matter would be dealt with better through immigration rules. Further changes to immigration rules would be needed alongside new clause 1 to ensure that the measure was focused on those fleeing conflict rather than wider family who are not refugees.

The new clause is an attempt to focus the Minister’s attention on the plight of families who are being separated all across Europe and need to be reunited. We should, out of compassion and as part of our support for refugees and for families and the family values that we hold dear, make more attempt to reunite families. It would be the best way for us to increase the number of refugees that we in Britain take. The Prime Minister set a target of 20,000 over the next five years, but we know that only 1,000 of those will be here before Christmas if the Government’s targets are met. They will need to go beyond that. The refugee crisis is not going away, and the most sensible, simple and fair way to provide more support for those who already have family here who could support them is for us in Britain to give them sanctuary.

We cannot make the debate on Syria simply one about security. It has to be about refugees and compassion as well. I know that the Government have done much to help refugees in the region, and I have praised them for doing so many times, but it is not an alternative to doing our bit to reunite families. There are so many ways in which the Government could do this; we have set out a series of ways in new clause 1 and in new clause 11. I have always sought to work on a cross-party basis and to build the biggest possible consensus. I urge the Minister in the same spirit to look carefully at what more he is able to do to help reunite some of the desperate refugee families who really need our help.

[Kelly Tolhurst]

I am sure that my hon. Friends and Opposition Members who served on the Public Bill Committee will agree that the debates were thoughtful and informative. I was extremely pleased to be a member of the Committee. Like my hon. Friends the Members for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris) and for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), in the past 12 months, as I have knocked on thousands of doors, I have found that immigration has been a big issue for my constituents. It has not been very often that I have knocked on a door and people have not raised this issue with me. I was therefore extremely pleased to be on the Bill Committee and to listen to the debate and hopefully increase my knowledge of certain aspects of the Bill.