A letter to Sarah Dines MP - and her reply!
A Lib Dem member has sent the following letter to our MP, Sarah Dines.
Dear Sarah Dines MP,
I write to you as my MP on a desperately urgent matter. I have just been watching on the national news a report of the shocking incompetence of British officials in the face of the flood of desperate refugees from Ukraine, seeking refuge in our country.
We were previously told by the government that anyone from Ukraine with a relative legally resident in the UK would be welcome to come here. We were said to be ready to accept up to 200,000 people who would be allowed to stay for up to 3 years.
That response to the current crisis was far less generous that other European countries but it now appears that even that was, for all practical purposes, a sham. Desperate people with relatives waiting to receive them are told they must have a British visa and then find there are no facilities available for them to obtain one.
Personally, I regard the statement that visas are necessary for 'security' reasons ridiculous and disingenuous. If a Ukrainian person legally resident in the UK is willing to vouch for a refugee that should be enough and even that vouching does not need to be done at the point of departure from the continent. It could and should be done at the point of entry to the UK. That would allow much greater official staff resources to be deployed. It would also allow British organisations and individuals the opportunity to provide immediate assistance to refugees in place of the overburdened resources of countries bordering Ukraine.
I must ask you please to prevail upon the Prime Minister to make this happen before our country embarrasses itself yet further. If Priti Patel is not capable of organising a response of appropriate speed, efficiency and compassion please prevail upon him also to replace her immediately with someone who can and will.
Yours sincerely,
We can only echo his concerns and await his reply.
Below is the reply from Sarah Dines MP. Spoiler alert, you may have seen it already, the one I received to a different letter was identical (apart from my name)
Dear .........,
Thank you for contacting me about the support the Home Office is providing to Ukrainian nationals.
The Russian attack on Ukraine is an unprovoked and anti-democratic act of aggression and I am appalled by the conduct of Putin's expansionist regime.
The situation in Ukraine remains deeply concerning and I have been especially troubled to learn of reports that Ukrainians who have left their homes have struggled to access the generous support provided by the Government. I am aware that this is an issue about which constituents care deeply, even taking the incredible step of offering to open up their home to those who have fled the country.
The situation is developing quickly, and so the Government has to evolve its plans to adapt. I therefore welcome the expansive Ukrainian Family Scheme which allows family members of British nationals, UK settled persons and certain others to come or stay in the UK. Those joining the Scheme will be granted leave for three years and will be able to work and access public funds. The Scheme is also free and does not include any salary or language requirements.
Ukrainians already in the UK with a visa will also be able to extend their stay by extending their visa or switching to another immigration route, where eligible, even if their visa does not normally allow them to do so.
Guidance on the support available to Ukrainian nationals and their family members can be found at this address: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/support-for-family-members-of-british-nationals-in-ukraine-and-ukrainian-nationals-in-ukraine-and-the-uk
Furthermore, the Government is establishing a humanitarian sponsorship pathway (the Local Sponsorship Scheme for Ukraine), which will open up a route to the UK for Ukrainians who may not have family ties with the UK but who are able to match with individuals, charities, businesses, and community groups. There will be no limit on this scheme and the UK will welcome as many Ukrainians who wish to come and have matched sponsors. Those who come under this scheme will be granted leave for an initial period of 12 months and will be able to work and access public services. Further details on the scheme will be published soon, including information on how people and organisations in the UK can apply to be sponsors.
It is vital that desperate Ukrainians fleeing their homes can access as the UK's generous package of support as quickly as possible. I am encouraged that the Minister for Safe and Legal Migration has taken the step of updating Parliament on the measures the Government is taking to speed up and process applications. I am pleased to confirm that staff have been surged to key visa application centres across Europe, particularly Poland, and more biometric kit has been moved to support them. Supporting this work from the UK, the Home Office has put casework teams on standby to process applications to ensure there are no delays.
It is essentially that a choke point is not created at places such as Calais. People smugglers are already present in the region, and it is essential that people do not attempt to make dangerous Channel crossings to enter the UK. I am encouraged that the Government is looking to establish a presence in Lille, alongside providing transport options, to help Ukrainians in the region.
While the Home Office has waived normal requirements for salary or language tests, the visa approval process allows for security and biometric checks to take place as they did for the evacuation of people from Afghanistan. The reason for this is to keep British citizens safe, particularly as Russian troops are now infiltrating Ukraine and merging into Ukrainian forces. Unfortunately, we know all too well what Putin's Russia is willing to do, even on our soil, as we saw through the Salisbury attack and the nerve agents used on the streets of the UK. I am encouraged that the UK has increased its visa processing capacity in the region ten-fold in anticipation of increased demand.
I am proud that Britain continues to lead and is doing its fair share in every aspect of this conflict. Ministers have assured me that they continue to keep the Government's handling of the situation under review as it develops.
Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.
Yours sincerely,
Sarah Dines MP
Member of Parliament for Derbyshire Dales
House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA
www.sarahdines.org.uk
Here is the reply to Sarah Dines that has been sent;
Dear Sarah Dines MP,
Thank you for your reply to my previous message on this subject of last Tuesday 8th March. I read your reply carefully and I noted the large amount of detail that it contained, detail which I must assume was provided by staff of the government minister or ministers concerned.
I must tell you that I was not to any great extent reassured. What I wrote about and am concerned about is an immediate and effective response, right now, to the refugee crisis that is happening, right now, in Ukraine, the countries bordering Ukraine and across Europe. What I read was a large range of policy ideas that might be an adequate response if they ever materialise and would undoubtedly go some way towards an adequate response if they were in evidence now. They are not.
I have many years' experience in management and I am well aware of what is required to deliver large complex solutions to large complex problems, effectively and promptly. I have seen very little of that in the visible performance of government agencies so far. Policy ideas are not plans and plans are not the same as outputs.
It is not as if this crisis were not predictable for weeks before it happened. All the signs were there both of the impending invasion and the flood of refugees that would follow. Furthermore, as far as government agencies are concerned, we have only recently experienced a comparable situation regarding Afghanistan, another situation where one could be forgiven for thinking ministers and their staff were asleep on the job.
Far from 'generous' and far from 'leading' this country's official response to the refugee crisis so far has been mean minded and embarrassingly poor compared even with countries like the Irish Republic, both much smaller than the UK and more remote from the location of the problem. What we are seeing has all the trappings of the 'hostile environment' policy that has already demeaned this country in the eyes of all decent people.
It is very clear that the greatest single contribution to the UK's lamentable failure is the rigid insistence on a visa regime that is entirely inappropriate to a refugee crisis. Desperate people in a desperate situation, seeking urgent help, are not able to comply with normal visa procedures and that should be obvious to anyone with an iota of common sense. It is obvious to other European countries which is why they have waived visa requirements during this crisis.
I for one, do not accept the argument that such onerous bureaucracy is necessary to 'keep us safe'. It has not done so to date. In recent years Russians have found it laughably easy to obtain visas and to enter the UK including Kleptocrats and Oligarchs, most of whom obtained their recent riches from various forms of fraud, theft and robbery as well as FSB agents and assassins.
The desperate refugees are almost all women, children and old people. There are very few Ukrainian men because they have stayed to fight and there are no Ukrainian soldiers because they are fighting already. The suggestion that Russian soldiers are going to impersonate Ukrainian soldiers, in order to pose as refugees so that they can enter the UK, is preposterous. In fact, it is an insult to the intelligence.
I must reiterate the point of my previous message. What is required, and required now, is a waiver of visa requirements for any refuge who has a UK based person willing to vouch for them, a massive increase in capacity to process incoming refugees without such a personal advocate and acceptance of refugees into the UK to be processed here.
All of these things are doable. All of them can be done quickly if the will is there. This crisis is a test of this government's sincerity in fulfilling its responsibilities towards refugees under the UN charter and a test of this government's competence to deal with a major social emergency. I must ask you once again to prevail upon the Prime Minister to ensure that these things are done.
Yours Sincerely,