Refugees: Children

Question

The Government acknowledges the importance of the message of His Holiness Pope Francis and the UK remains fully committed to playing our part in supporting refugees and tackling the migration crisis.

From the outset of the crisis the UK has pushed for a comprehensive approach that focuses on the root causes of migration and has called for more action in source and transit countries to disrupt the smuggling networks, to improve local capacity to control borders, and to support sustainable livelihoods, both for people living there and for refugees. It is essential that we take action to support individuals affected by conflict in their region of origin, and do not encourage people to risk their lives by making dangerous journeys to Europe. This is why the Government has established the Vulnerable Children’s Resettlement Scheme, which will resettle up to 3,000 individuals from the Middle East and North Africa region by the end of this Parliament. This is in addition to our commitment to resettle 20,000 Syrians to the UK over the same time period. So far over 4,400 have arrived in the UK, around half of whom are children.

The Government has committed £2.3 billion to the Syria crisis, over £70 million in response to the wider Mediterranean migration crisis, and we have established a £10 million Refugee Children Fund for Europe to support the needs of vulnerable refugee and migrant children arriving in Europe. In 2016, we also transferred over 900 unaccompanied asylum seeking children from within Europe to the UK. The Government recognises the particular vulnerabilities of child migrants and victims of modern slavery. This is why the Home Secretary launched in October 2016 a £3 million Child Trafficking Protection Fund aimed at reducing vulnerability to exploitation and victim support and recovery.