Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how they consider that people designated as "no recourse to public funds" under the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 will have access to food during the lockdown.

The Home Office is working closely with other government departments, including the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs to support people, including migrants with no recourse to public funds (NRPF), through this crisis.? Departments are sharing what they are learning from other bodies and charities with each other to ensure we continue to take a compassionate and pragmatic approach to an unprecedented situation.

Many of the wide-ranging Covid-19 measures the Government has put in place, including the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, Self-employment Income Support Scheme and rental and mortgage protections are not public funds and therefore are available to migrants with NRPF.

Local authorities can provide basic safety net support if it is established there is a care need which does not arise solely from destitution, for example, where there are community care needs, migrants with serious health problems or family cases where the wellbeing of a child is in question. The Government has provided more than £3.2 billion of funding to local authorities in England, and additional funding under the Barnett formula to the devolved administrations to enable them to respond to Covid-19 pressures across all the services they deliver, including services helping the most vulnerable. In addition, on the 8th April the Chancellor announced an additional £750m package of support for charities across the UK to ensure they can continue their vital work during the Covid-19 pandemic.

More information on the support available for migrants affected by Covid-19 can be found on Gov.uk https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-get-support-if-youre-a-migrant-living-in-the-uk.

We will keep the situation under review and consider further measures if needed.