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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2016-09-12.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to identify families in the UK who would be willing to receive related unaccompanied child refugees from the refugee camps in Calais.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

UK Government officials have confirmed that the Citizens UK list has been passed to the French authorities, who are primarily responsible for migrants on French territory.

We continue to work with the French authorities and others to speed up exist-ing family reunification processes or implement new processes where necessary. We will shortly be seconding another official to the French Interior Ministry to support these efforts.

We have established a dedicated team in the Home Office Dublin Unit to lead on family reunion cases for unaccompanied children. Transfer requests under the Dublin Regulation are now generally processed within 10 days and children transferred within weeks. Over 120 children have been accepted for transfer this year from Europe; over 70 of these are from France.

It is important that the due processes under the Dublin Regulation are followed. This position was recently confirmed in a Court of Appeal judgement (“ZAT and others”). Families are only contacted once a transfer request has been made and a family link has been established. When we accept a request to transfer an unaccompanied minor we liaise with Local Authorities and the child’s family.

A new scheme to allow community groups to directly sponsor a refugee family was launched by the Home Secretary and Archbishop of Canterbury on 19 July. The Full Community Sponsorship scheme enables community groups including charities, faith groups, churches and businesses, to take on the role of supporting resettled refugees in the UK. A ‘Help Refugees in the UK’ web-page has also been developed on GOV.UK to make it easier for the public to support refugees in the UK and allow local authorities to focus support on the goods and services that refugees need.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2016-09-12.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to secure the co-operation of voluntary organisations that are ready to assist in welcoming child refugees.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

UK Government officials have confirmed that the Citizens UK list has been passed to the French authorities, who are primarily responsible for migrants on French territory.

We continue to work with the French authorities and others to speed up exist-ing family reunification processes or implement new processes where necessary. We will shortly be seconding another official to the French Interior Ministry to support these efforts.

We have established a dedicated team in the Home Office Dublin Unit to lead on family reunion cases for unaccompanied children. Transfer requests under the Dublin Regulation are now generally processed within 10 days and children transferred within weeks. Over 120 children have been accepted for transfer this year from Europe; over 70 of these are from France.

It is important that the due processes under the Dublin Regulation are followed. This position was recently confirmed in a Court of Appeal judgement (“ZAT and others”). Families are only contacted once a transfer request has been made and a family link has been established. When we accept a request to transfer an unaccompanied minor we liaise with Local Authorities and the child’s family.

A new scheme to allow community groups to directly sponsor a refugee family was launched by the Home Secretary and Archbishop of Canterbury on 19 July. The Full Community Sponsorship scheme enables community groups including charities, faith groups, churches and businesses, to take on the role of supporting resettled refugees in the UK. A ‘Help Refugees in the UK’ web-page has also been developed on GOV.UK to make it easier for the public to support refugees in the UK and allow local authorities to focus support on the goods and services that refugees need.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2016-09-12.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the announcement by the Home Office that they have secured the necessary places with councils and devolved administrations across the UK to settle 20,000 Syrian refugees by 2020, whether the majority of those refugees will be settled in the UK by 2018; and if not, what steps they are taking to speed up the admissions process.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

The Government has been working with local authorities and devolved administrations across the UK in order to ensure we have the capacity and infrastructure to meet our commitment to resettle 20,000 vulnerable Syrians by the end of this Parliament and through these discussions local authorities have committed their involvement in the resettlement programme between now and 2020.

We are not complacent. There is still a significant amount of work to be done with regions and local authorities to turn these pledges into arrivals. But we are committed to resettling 20,000 vulnerable Syrian refugees by the end of this Parliament and we are on track to do that.

The numbers resettled in a particular period will depend on a range of factors including the flow of referrals from United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the field and the availability of suitable accommodation and care packages in the UK. We will manage the flows based on need and in support of the well-being of the people and communities involved, rather than rushing to meet arbitrary targets.