The debate on the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee report on their inquiry into refugees and asylum seekers in Wales is the next item, and I call on the Chair of the committee to move the motion—John Griffiths.

Motion NDM6334 John Griffiths

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

Notes the report of the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee on the inquiry into refugees and asylum seekers in Wales, which was laid in the Table Office on 6 April 2017.

Motion moved.

Diolch yn fawr, Llywydd. I am very pleased today to have the time during refugee week to debate our committee’s report on refugees and asylum seekers in Wales. The context for the inquiry is the tragedy of war, instability, and displacement. The latest UN study, published on Monday, found that 65.6 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide at the end of 2016. On average, 20 people were driven from their homes every minute last year, or one every three seconds. And the total number of people seeking safety across international borders as refugees topped 22.5 million, the highest number since the second world war.

The images and stories of people escaping war and persecution in Syria, Iraq, and other countries is tragically familiar. The perilous journey many of them take in crossing the Mediterranean in small, overcrowded boats has resulted in countless people, many of them children, dying before they make it to shore. As the committee heard, those who survive to reach the UK, including unaccompanied children, are likely to have experienced hugely traumatic events, which leave lasting psychological scars, and, at this extremely vulnerable time in their lives, they face a fresh set of major challenges. We were told that a phrase often used by refugees and asylum seekers is ‘I used to be someone’. We made this powerful and telling statement the title of our report.

We were mindful, when we decided on how to approach our inquiry, that asylum policy is the responsibility of the UK Government. However, the experience of refugees and asylum seekers in Wales depends largely on the accessibility and quality of devolved services, and so is within the remit of Welsh Government. During our inquiry, we looked at the Welsh Government’s refugee and asylum seeker delivery plan and community cohesion delivery plan. We also took evidence on the resettlement in Wales of Syrian refugees, as well as support for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children who face particular challenges. As well as taking written and oral evidence, we visited Cardiff and Swansea and Glasgow and Edinburgh. We also corresponded with the Home Office and the provider of asylum accommodation in Wales.

We found evidence of good practice across Wales. It is clear that in many places, and in many ways, both public services and the third sector are working effectively to help refugees and asylum seekers to adjust to life in our communities and to get the support they need. However, we also heard evidence that, in a number of areas, the Welsh Government needs to do more to help delivery partners. It needs to make representations to the UK Government, refresh its strategic direction, and get directly involved in delivery.

It is gratifying that the committee’s work made a significant impact during the inquiry even before we had drawn our conclusions. We were pleased of two key developments before we published our report: first, the expansion of the role of the Welsh Government’s operations board to cover all refugees and asylum seekers, not just the Syrian resettlement programme. Second, stakeholders reported to us that, as a result of the representations made to, and by, the committee, there is meaningful engagement between the private and third sectors on asylum accommodation. So, our work is already having a real impact on people’s lives.

These are important and welcome steps, but we face wide-ranging and complex challenges. That’s why we made 19 recommendations to Welsh Government, 18 of which have been accepted in full or accepted in principle.

Dirprwy Lywydd, it is important for me to put on record at this point that, while we strive for consensus in our committee work, on this occasion, one Member was not able to agree the report. Nevertheless, the agreement of the other seven Members represents a powerful majority for the changes that we want to see.

We have called for an updated and improved strategic approach. This has three main elements, each of which was the subject of a committee recommendation that the Cabinet Secretary accepted. First, reviewing the refugee and asylum seeker delivery plan—I would be grateful if the Cabinet Secretary would confirm that the plan will contain measurable actions, timescales and resources as well as best practice from Scotland, including service standards. Second, ensuring that the operations board meets regularly and openly—I hope that the Cabinet Secretary will share the board’s forward work programme with the committee. Third, preparing for the implementation of the UK immigration Act—it would be helpful to know what stage the Cabinet Secretary has reached in his discussions with stakeholders and the UK Government on this important matter.

We also ask the Welsh Government to do more to facilitate integration. The Cabinet Secretary has agreed to update the community cohesion plan and I would welcome confirmation that this will include a Wales-wide publicity campaign, similar to the one in Scotland, which impressed the committee.

Alongside our recommendation on the cohesion plan, we called for action on the specific areas of concern raised by stakeholders. The Welsh Government has accepted that the role of community cohesion co-ordinators should be expanded beyond only supporting Syrian refugees. The Cabinet Secretary’s response suggested that the role of the co-ordinators in supporting refugees and asylum seekers is not permanent and I would welcome clarification on this.

We agreed with stakeholders that another key barrier to integration is transport. We recommended that the Welsh Government consider extending concessionary transport schemes to refugees and asylum seekers. The Cabinet Secretary has rejected this recommendation. It would be helpful if we could hear more detail this afternoon about the reasons for that and if the Cabinet Secretary may be able to address this issue in other ways.

An area of particular focus for the committee, following the evidence we received, was the provision of teaching of English for speakers of other languages. We wanted to see improvements for the academic year starting in September. I appreciate that the tight timescales for doing so have led the Cabinet Secretary to accept this recommendation in principle, for implementation over a slightly longer period. I would welcome confirmation of the timescales and reassurance that the detailed points made by the committee will be addressed.

Asylum accommodation was another key area of interest for the committee. We called for better monitoring and resolution of complaints about asylum accommodation. We recommended revising the asylum accommodation contract before its next renewal. The Cabinet Secretary has accepted these recommendations in principle and I look forward to hearing what this means in practical terms. We also wanted asylum seekers’ landlords to be registered and inspected. I am pleased that the Welsh Government has fully accepted this recommendation and I would welcome some detail on how it is to be implemented.

The committee also called for improvements to advice and support during the asylum process. This was accepted in principle. Effective support after the asylum process is essential, both for refugees and those whose asylum applications are not successful. So, also accepted in principle were our recommendations on this, calling for more help for refugees to find accommodation, better access to education and employment and action to prevent destitution.

The Deputy Presiding Officer (Ann Jones) took the Chair.

On the specific needs of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, the committee was convinced by the evidence we heard that we need more proactive support, and that’s why we called for a guardianship service. We also wanted to ensure there is capacity and capability across Wales to undertake age assessments, and we received powerful evidence of the need to set minimum standards for mental health support. Again, the Cabinet Secretary has accepted in principle our recommendations about support for children, and again, it would be helpful for us and for stakeholders to hear more from the Cabinet Secretary about how he will ensure that he meets, in full, the thrust of our recommendations, even if he is unable, for reasons I am sure he will explain, to commit to every detail.

Dirprwy Lywydd, I’m sure Members of the committee, as well as other Members in the Chamber here today, will wish to address some of the detail in what is a wide-ranging and comprehensive report. But before I finish, I’d like to highlight the final recommendation the committee made, which the Welsh Government has accepted in principle. The Welsh Refugee Coalition drew our attention to the seven steps to sanctuary. These have been developed by over 20 organisations and are reproduced in our report. We share the coalition’s view that Wales should take these steps and become the world’s first nation of sanctuary. Diolch yn fawr.

Can I thank the committee? Obviously, I’m not a member of the committee, but I thought this was a really focused and forthright piece of work, so I’m not surprised it’s been influential already. I thank the Cabinet Secretary as well, because judging by the quoted evidence in the report, you certainly took a very open and responsive approach to the evidence that was heard there.

With regard to support for Syrian refugees in particular, I think it would be fair to observe that any government—and, you know, we’re talking about more than two Governments in this; there are several just across the continent of Europe—they had a very short time to try and manage a major displacement of people. They’re faced with a huge challenge, and with the best planning in the world, I think the early and very urgent days when demand was outstripping the capacity to meet it is—. You know, obviously it comes as a shock to us, but we need to understand that that’s almost inevitable.

But even so, John, you might remember me asking you back in September if you were going to have a look at why Wales had taken in only a 112 Syrian refugees, and 13 local authorities at that stage hadn’t taken any at all. I can see in the evidence that Unison told you that the preparedness of local authorities effectively dictated the pace of response. But I’m just wondering if the committee really got to the bottom of that, to establish why councils like Torfaen—who deserve great congratulation in this—were able to get their acts together far more quickly than other councils, because that would certainly have affected the ability of the UN and the ancillary workers to match individuals that they verified before they left Syria with the local authorities in Wales. From the report, it seems that once the streamlined system got going, it seems to have proven to be a much better experience for those who went through it.

I can certainly see the attraction of removing the distinction between the Syrian vulnerable person resettlement scheme and the standard asylum route. I appreciate that’s not a matter for this place. But there is a question, I think, whether the distinction can be removed safely without the beginning of the process being located in, or at least very near, the country of origin. Nevertheless, I really do wish the Welsh Government’s operations board only the very best in trying to square that circle, if, in fact, there’s a circle there to be squared. It does, kind of, sit a little at odds with the concern that you raised, John, about the future of the cohesion co-ordinators. You know, it seems a little bit out of kilter, when you’re talking about equalising two systems, that that doesn’t stretch as far as the co-ordinators.

The point made about the 56-day move-on period certainly caught my eye, as did the various recommendations to help with integration from the perspective of the asylum-seeking refugee, and members of the community, of course, into which they’re coming. It goes without saying, I think, that the community cohesion plan needs to get to grips with the myths that are surrounding asylum seekers and refugees—their rights, their financial support, their ability to work and so on. But I think it also needs to be really bold and unshakeable when we’re talking about children, accompanied or otherwise. Yes, there are children in Wales who have serious needs and lives that we—. We should feel culpable that we still have children living as they do, but children are children, and I don’t care where they’re from—their rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child are rights we’ve all committed to observe. The patch of earth on which you come into this world should not really determine the level of support you can expect if you happen to find yourself a child in Wales. An unaccompanied child will have no responsibility for the decision about why they came to this country and the way in which it was done. They will probably have endured tremendous trauma before the journey had even begun. They cannot be overlooked just because a child who lives here already also has grave needs. Cabinet Secretary, it’s these later recommendations in the report that I hope have really made an impression on you, as they have on me. I recall that it was actually Leanne Wood, I think, who brought one example of a story that you’d heard about an unaccompanied child, and the horrors that they’d gone through—coming in from Calais, that was. That is a child—I don’t care where they’ve come from. Nobody should go through that experience.

I thought it was very telling, actually, that people coming to this country in chaotic circumstances often saw the acquisition of functioning English to be just as much of a priority as decent housing and access to social and financial support. The inability to communicate has to be the most isolating experience in the world. I know this is expensive, Cabinet Secretary, and I appreciate it’ll take time, but there are recommendations in this report about using students and volunteers, under professional guidance, that really might just help to speed this up a little bit. Of course—you know, co-production—let’s use some of those refugees and asylum seekers who’ve acquired some skills themselves, because their volunteering more generally is also key to improving their communication skills, their confidence, their networking and other skills that improve mental resilience, which I know we’ve spoken about before.

I’ve plenty of other words of congratulations for you, John, and the committee, but I’ll leave those for another day as I’m out of time. Thank you.

We’re praising another committee this week, then, Suzy—there’s a theme appearing here. I’d like to thank the Chair and the other members of the committee—most of the members of the committee—for agreeing to this report. It’s actually one of the most rewarding experiences that I’ve had in a long time. Quite often, we may go to outreach events where there is a decent number of people attending, but it’s not as many as we might have anticipated, sometimes. I turned up at the YMCA in Swansea and the place was reeling with people—people falling out of the doors because there wasn’t enough room for them to engage with me and Joyce Watson, who were there on behalf of the committee.

For me, the biggest thing was that they wanted to be heard and they wanted to make a difference in the country that they had arrived in, which was Wales. They wanted to impress upon politicians that they deserved to have that voice and that they are worthy of that voice, and I pledged from that day on to make sure that I would try to represent them to the best of my ability.

The area that was the biggest issue of concern for them in that particular public meeting was housing. I do thank the Cabinet Secretary, actually, for being quite forward thinking—he’s allowed me to meet with civil servants to discuss these particular issues. I’ve also met with Swansea council, who’ve said to me directly that because of the changes and the recommendations of the committee they too are putting forward protocol changes in how they inspect properties.

But, what we could see loud and clear was that some of the properties that people were living in were abysmal—utterly abysmal. Nobody should have to live in a house like that, whether they’re from Syria, whether they’re from Iraq or whether they’re from Aberfan—they should not have to live in those types of conditions. So, I’ve personally met with Clearsprings on many occasions now to make home inspections, and they’re changing their practices. I think it’s important that we make sure that the recommendations in the report are heard loud and clear by Clearsprings, and that they are heard by the UK Government when they go forward in renewing that contract.

We need to have stiffer monitoring; we need to have equalities training for staff, because we heard from asylum seekers that they were not treated fairly in many instances by those who entered their properties; and we need to make sure that there’s an independent complaints procedure, if not an independent complaints mechanism. Many people didn’t feel comfortable in ringing Clearsprings, because they were the company that had alienated them the most when they first arrived in the UK. I hope that those are things that the Cabinet Secretary will carry forth and pursue.

We also had lots of evidence from those who came into the committee that they actually wanted to devolve this responsibility to the National Assembly for Wales, and I would also hope therefore that the Cabinet Secretary would push to be able to do that. I know that the housing sector here say that they are competent and able to do that, so why not devolve it, when we have all of the other housing responsibilities here in this place?

With regard to other areas of interest, I thought it was really harrowing to hear one psychiatrist who came to give evidence. He said that a lot young people who arrived in the UK had sexually transmitted diseases. This, for me, was something awful to hear as part of an evidence session. So, I note your response in saying that more money is going into CAMHS, but what can we be doing in particular for these people, who’ve gone through trauma that we will never be able to understand and have gone through experiences that we will never get to grips with? So, what specific training are you going to be able to provide for those CAMHS officials that would be different to how they would deal with, potentially, other conditions here in Wales?

Another issue for me—I’ve got so many on this agenda, as you can see—I’ve met asylum seekers and they’ve said, ‘Yes, I want to learn English or Welsh, but I want to be able to do that in a way that is relevant to me’. So, I’ve met a plumber from Syria who lives in Neath, and he says, ‘Well, I want to learn English, but I don’t want to just go into a room and sit there. Academia, sitting at a table, actually, is really intimidating for me. So, can I do an apprenticeship course in plumbing or electrical appliances, but can I do the English learning through that particular course?’ He said there’s nothing available for him to be able to do that at the moment. So, I hope that’s something, again, that if not directly reflected in the report—now that I’ve said it, you can look into it further, Cabinet Secretary.

In the time I’ve got left, I think it’s important that we address the cultural and integration issues. I think it’s important that we don’t see this as just a responsibility for the refugees to integrate amongst us; that we need to change our attitudes also towards refugees and asylum seekers. It’s really unfortunate that we had one member of the committee putting out some document that did not represent the views of what we heard in committee. We are proud as a nation to welcome refugees, and we are proud to support those refugees and we should not shy away from doing so.

I met an Iraqi refugee last week who had lost every single member of his family as a result of the conflict in Iraq. Getting rid of Saddam Hussein seemed a good idea at the time to many, in 2003, but the words of caution were not heeded—that this would lead to a conflagration of sectarian conflict that most people in this country, quite rightly, had little understanding of the complexity of it. This turf war that has erupted—this sectarian strife—he could not have paid a higher price. Did we have a duty to offer asylum to this individual and others like him? Of course, we do.

When asylum seekers are first dispersed to Wales, most of them arrive at Lynx House on Newport Road in my constituency. After three or four weeks in hostel accommodation, they are then placed in temporary accommodation—which may be in Cardiff, it may be in Newport, it may be in Swansea or maybe further afield. Most asylum-seeking families are destitute, arriving with little more than the clothes on their backs. Our inquiry highlights that children make up between 13 and 20 per cent of the local destitute population.

It’s a sad fact that asylum seeker benefits are too low to actually meet the basic needs of this community and one of the biggest problems faced by families is that they simply don’t have the bus fare to get to services. So, they have to walk or go by bike. So, it’s particularly important that services are available near to Lynx House, because obviously that is where there is a concentration of asylum seekers.

I just want to pay tribute to members of the community who have risen to the challenge and who are providing services, mainly on a voluntary basis, picking up on the fact that Cardiff is a city of sanctuary for those seeking refuge from war and persecution and that that is a network of people who are prepared to promote mainly voluntary partnerships to support people seeking sanctuary here.

For example, the Oasis refugee centre, which the committee visited, is based in a former Methodist church in Splott. Set up in 2008, Oasis Cardiff has helped hundreds who have fled war and political persecution from a huge range of countries that have been overcome by war and conflict—many of them our Government has helped, or failed to avoid. It’s got nine part-time staff and literally dozens of volunteers, because at least 150 people walk through the door every single day. When we visited, there were at least 35 people in an upstairs room all being given English for speakers of other languages lessons from one individual volunteer—it was an incredible sight.

Within my constituency, which is not that far away from Oasis, there is the Trinity Centre, which is based in another former Methodist church. For the last five years, they have provided a home for at least three voluntary organisations. Space4U operates a drop-in system offering information, English lessons, a food and clothing bank, craft sessions, as well as food and drink and friendship. There’s a parent and toddler group linked to Space4U held twice a week, and that’s open, not just to asylum seekers and refugees, but to members of the local community as well, and so it’s a great opportunity for people to interact and to practice what little English they may have. There’s also something called Home4U, working closely with Space4U, to offer temporary accommodation in empty properties that have been lent to the project.

One of my constituents plays a strategic role in overseeing these services, undeterred by the fact that he’s been struck down by Parkinson’s, and I was deeply honoured to nominate him and his wife to attend the Queen’s garden party in recognition of his contribution to the community, despite his disability.

In light of the heinous terrorist attack allegedly committed by another of my constituents this week, I thought it was really important to put on record that most of my constituents in Cardiff Central are more than happy to offer the hand of friendship. I thank you for listening to my contribution.

Thanks to the Chairman for laying the committee’s report before the Chamber. The report is concerned primarily with improving conditions for refugees and asylum seekers once they have arrived in Wales, and to that end, it is a worthy effort. There was a lot of painstaking evidence heard relating to refugee conditions in Wales, and several of the committee members were skilful in bringing these conditions to light. And in itself, the desire to improve conditions for refugees is a laudable aim.

However, there are bound to be potential pitfalls in making such a report. One such pitfall is the danger of providing services to refugees that go beyond the services provided to ordinary members of the public. For instance, we can try to improve housing conditions for refugees, but this may not seem palatable to large sections of the public, if it means that they have to drop behind the refugees in the queue for social housing.

Will you take an intervention?

No. The housing issue is perhaps the most obvious pitfall, and one that is discussed quite frequently among people I encounter in the course of normal life when refugee issues are raised.

Related to the issue of housing provision is one of funding. During the evidence sessions, we were at one point strongly advised by the relevant Minister, Carl Sargeant, not to lobby for extra powers without first securing a guarantee of extra funding. He warned that this had been done in the past, and problems had arisen as a result. When I look at the recommendations that are now coming, I struggle to see that there is any sign of any extra money coming from the Home Office or from any other department in Westminster. The Welsh Government itself is looking at setting up a small grants fund to avoid destitution for failed asylum seekers, but as far as I understand it, this is money coming from the Welsh Government’s own budget. So, what services will have to be cut from elsewhere in the budget to allow for this? And in any case, we don’t know if any of the money is going to be forthcoming.

One of the points that kept recurring in the evidence sessions was that destitution was inevitable among failed asylum seekers, as there was no welfare payment for them once they had failed their initial claim. But there is also no settled method of repatriating them to their country of origin. Most of them don’t have the money to fund their own repatriation. Many of the failed asylum seekers as a result remain in the UK and simply disappear off the map. It is truly an absurd system. We cannot hope to change this system in Wales as the powers to do so do not lie with us. But with this report, we are attempting to become the world’s first nation of sanctuary, which may encourage many more asylum seekers to try and come here. The inevitable effect of more coming without any prior reform of the asylum system will, I fear, be more destitution. Thank you.

I want to actually disassociate myself, as I’m sure everybody else here of a reasonable mind would do, from the comments of the previous speaker. But, however, as is set out in the report’s introduction, this was the committee’s first major inquiry, and it was undertaken at a time when we’re experiencing the worst global refugee crisis since the second world war. And politically, it was launched in the months after the Brexit vote, and the refugee crisis, without a doubt, shaped some of those Brexit arguments around the EU’s stability and sustainability. But more widely, it appeared at that time that nationalist movements were sweeping the continent, though following recent defeats for Eurosceptic populists at elections in France, Austria and Netherlands, and reverses in Finland, Italy and Germany, maybe the tide has turned.

Nevertheless, at the time, there were people who argued that the committee should not prioritise the plight of refugees and asylum seekers in Wales. My UKIP committee colleague refused to endorse the report, despite having not raised any objections whatsoever during the actual inquiry. But I’ll move on from that. I, for one, am proud of this report, and I think it reflects well on this Assembly and on Wales that we undertook this work. In the same vein, I think that Gareth Bennett’s alternative paper, titled ‘Wales’ Refugee Problem’, reflects poorly on his party—light on evidence, but heavy on prejudice.

But for the most part, there was lots of support for the inquiry. Groups like the Hay, Brecon and Talgarth refugee support group provided real insight into what is happening on the ground, and one of the issues that they did identify was a perceived disconnect between those voluntary groups and the professional-led services. I think the Powys group represents the best of our nation’s generosity and goodwill, and while we, of course, need professional co-ordination, it would be wrong to squash grass-roots enthusiasm with bureaucratic heavy-handedness. And I’d like to put on record my thanks to every volunteer, whoever they are, who give help and support to the most vulnerable people in society and a warm, Welsh welcome.

I’ll return to the report and I shall pick up on a couple of the recommendations. As chair of the Assembly cross-party group concerned with human trafficking, I’m particularly concerned about the plight of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children. So, I’m encouraged that the Government has accepted in principle the recommendation for a child guardianship service for Wales. The Minister will know that is something that the cross-party group that I chair has campaigned for for a very long time. I want to really focus on this, because I know that children, under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, will have access to advocacy, but I really want to separate out the difference between advocacy and guardianship. Guardianship does mean that somebody, whosoever they are, has the legal recognition to speak on behalf of the child, whosoever they are, so that they don’t have to repeat their harrowing stories time and time again when they are trying to access the services that they so desperately need. And I think we need to think about that in terms of their welfare, their well-being and their mental health capacity to do that. I want to give an example: when I had the privilege of meeting a young person who’d come to the UK as an unaccompanied minor, they told me that they intend to train to become a doctor. That young individual demonstrated humility and compassion, despite the treatment that they had endured on their journey here. I have no doubt whatsoever that those qualities will be used—when they do qualify—by that individual to whoever may need them. It may well be the case that they use those qualities when they become a GP or a doctor later in life and that they actually show a little bit of humility and compassion to some of those who speak against them.

Thank you. Julie Morgan.

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, for calling me to speak in this very important debate. I’m not a member of the committee, but I’d like to congratulate the committee and the Chair on the extensive work that has gone into this report and I think it’s very good that we’re able to debate it during Refugee Week, and I welcome the fact that the Welsh Government has accepted many of the committee’s recommendations. And although, as the report clearly says, overall asylum policy is of course the responsibility of the UK Government, I agree that it’s absolutely important that we do our utmost here in Wales to make people’s and their families’ lives better when they arrive as refugees and asylum seekers, especially when the services that they use are our responsibility. So, I think we have a clear role in this process because we do know that refugee and asylum seekers do face a host of problems when they arrive in this country—from poor housing, problems with language and also, I think, often a lack of understanding from us, from the public, about what the circumstances were that they have left, because I think there is a general lack of understanding of some of the horrific circumstances that asylum seekers have left.

It’s already been mentioned today: the good work that is going on in terms of welcoming refugees and asylum seekers, and I’m very proud that Cardiff has 52 organisations dedicated to working together in a City of Sanctuary networking group. I know that there are other groups in Swansea, Hay-on-Wye, Brecon and Talgarth, and I welcome the recommendation in the committee that there should be the seven steps adopted by the Welsh Government to becoming a nation of sanctuary.

But some of the issues that do affect the asylum seekers in particular most profoundly are issues that are part of the UK Government’s decisions, but they do affect them profoundly here. One of the biggest issues that’s been raised with me from asylum seekers over the years, really, is the fact that they’re not able to work, and I think that that is one of the big problems that has caused major difficulties in them being able to integrate easily, because many, obviously, have the qualifications and skills that we desperately need.

Towards the end of the last year I attended an event in the Pierhead, which was a joint event between the BBC World Service and Radio Wales, and people came to the Pierhead who’d come to this country as asylum seekers and they desperately wanted to work. And it wasn’t just for financial reasons, but because they wanted to give something back to the country that had taken them in. Many of the asylum seekers who I have met over the years have had skills that we really need. I’ve met doctors, teachers, people who could really help us as a country, but as things stand they can only apply for permission to take up jobs on the UK’s official shortage occupation list if they’ve waited for more than 12 months for their claim to be decided, and they’re not themselves considered to have caused the delay. So, I know that this is the decision of the UK Government, but I just feel that we should air this here in the National Assembly for Wales because it is having such a profound effect on people who are here living in our country, so I wanted to flag up that.

There’s already been quite a bit of discussion about housing, and I’m really pleased about the progress that has been made and that the Cabinet Secretary has moved forward. But one of the recommendations of the report is to make an immediate assessment of the UK Immigration Act 2016 and the effect that it’s going to have in Wales. I know that this has been brought up with the Cabinet Secretary quite a lot by the committee, and I just wanted to ask whether there’s any more information about when the right to rent checks will be introduced. Will they be introduced in Wales? How will it affect families? Will it affect families with children and is this likely to lead to more risk of destitution? I know the Cabinet Secretary, I believe, was trying to get clarification from the Home Office, so I wondered if there was anything he could tell us today in response to that.

Finally, I wanted to end on the issue of the children. I think it is absolutely to our shame as a nation that we’re only allowing in a very limited number of unaccompanied asylum seeker and refugee children, despite all the efforts of Lord Dubs in getting that amendment passed in the House of Lords. We understand from the report that the UK Government has now quietly closed the scheme with only 350 having been brought to Britain. So, I think this is an absolute disgrace, an absolute shame, because, as other people have said in this debate, children are children are children. Whatever’s happened to them, wherever they’ve come from, they need to be welcomed here in Wales, and I think it is a great shame that the UK Government has limited them in this way.

As a member of the committee, I also want to welcome this report. It is, indeed, a comprehensive piece of work. The committee has been very ably chaired by John Griffiths, and I also want to put on record my appreciation for the work of our committee staff, who have ably assisted us.

In my contribution, I wish to focus on some of the recommendations contained within the ‘“I used to be someone” Refugees and asylum seekers in Wales’ report. Recommendation 4 called on the Welsh Government to review the community cohesion national delivery plan 2016-17, and emphasises that the new,

‘improved Plan should include a communications strategy that emphasises the benefits of immigration to Welsh society and dispels myths and inaccuracies about refugees and asylum seekers.’

We have seen some of these portrayed earlier.

We have seen in the past few traumatic months how, within these islands, extremists of various warped ideologies have sought to sow division and hate, and we’ve also seen the overwhelming community response of unity and love from across different community groups and from individuals. I note the Welsh Government’s response that they’ve

‘funded the Asylum Rights Programme, through the Equality & Inclusion Programme, to work with refugees and asylum seekers to co-produce media reports which challenge negative stereotypes.’

This is vital, and I’m sure that Members will have seen the public concern and disquiet about how the recent terrorist attacks have been reported within the mainstream print media. The heinous attacks in Manchester, Westminster and London bridge were portrayed as acts of terrorism, committed by terrorists, yet ‘The Times’ newspaper, just yesterday, had on its front page headline the emotive phrase of ‘lone wolf’ to describe the latest terrorist in the UK, whilst also prominently referencing potential mitigating issues of the mental health suffering of that white suspect. For all our citizens, there must be no differentiation. Terrorist attacks are committed by terrorists, no matter what their skin colour. I stress this because it is vital that there is no perception that we are stigmatising one community over another.

Recommendation 15 seeks that,

‘The Welsh Government should do more to help refugees and asylum seekers access education and employment by’ three principal moves: firstly,

‘promoting the Credit and Qualifications Framework for Wales as widely as possible’; secondly,

‘requiring Welsh universities to treat refugees as home students’; and, thirdly, to create,

‘more opportunities for public sector internships’.

I’m heartened that the Welsh Government, in its response, emphatically recognises the importance of education and employment for effective integration into society’, and that it will update the ESOL policy for Wales and map ESOL provision as currently available. I note that the Welsh Government strategic equality plan includes the aim for the Welsh Government itself to become an exemplar of diversity and inclusion by 2020. That, also, has to be right. The Welsh Government and we here, as Members of the National Assembly for Wales, must model to the Welsh nation that Wales will always be an open, tolerant, multicultural and diverse country.

I was struck by the quality of the representations made to the committee—I also, as have others, have met asylum seekers and refugees as part of this work and outside of it—and of the Children’s Society, who helped clearly illuminate to me some key issues around the implementation of the 2016 Immigration Act in Wales, which Julie Morgan has already mentioned. This is engendering great concern in England. It is right, Cabinet Secretary, that Welsh Government in its response to our report is in favour of an evaluation of the Immigration Act 2016 on right-to-rent checks in England. But this roll-out should be evaluated by the Home Secretary prior to any roll-out across Wales, due to rises in reported concerns from landlords, refused tenants and the work of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants’ report—all such matters will no doubt contribute to the increase in both registered and reported hate crime.

Finally, here in the National Assembly for Wales, I would like to say that we all, here, in this place—I would like to say—have the will, the desire and the impetus to take on these many challenges, as it is in the interest of all of our citizens, and it is the humanity, values and decency of the Welsh people that drives us as representatives in this regard and in this report. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I call on the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children, Carl Sargeant.

Thank you, Deputy Llywydd. I’d like to thank the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee for their considered report on refugees and asylum seekers in Wales. I’m also grateful for the time and effort given by those working in public services and refugee support organisations to ensure this process was as comprehensive as possible.

The Welsh Government is committed to ensuring refugees and asylum seekers who have fled war, violence and persecution are able to fulfil their potential. Wales has a proud history of providing sanctuary for refugees from across the world, and this tradition will continue. We will continue our focus on supporting refugees by developing an updated refugee and asylum seeker delivery plan, taking full account of the committee’s report and the recommendations. John Griffiths, the Chair, who ably chaired the committee, asked the question, ‘When will this happen?’ We will consult on the draft plan in the autumn, including the refugees and asylum seekers in that process.

Dirprwy Lywydd, we cannot ignore the fact that much of the responsibility relating to asylum policy is reserved to the UK Government, and this means the solutions to some important and challenging problems raised by the committee must be implemented by the UK Government. We will work with them to achieve this, for example, by discussing possible solutions to improve conditions here in Wales, and this includes the standard of asylum accommodation, an independent complaints process, the availability of increased funding for transport, health screening reminders and ways to avoid destitution for asylum seekers and new refugees. Indeed, Bethan Jenkins, we have had much correspondence regarding the state of the some of the accommodation, which was absolutely shocking in terms of people being expected to live in it.

We’re also taking action ourselves and investing in significant support for refugees and asylum seekers here in Wales, and this includes approximately £1 million over the next three years, under the Asylum Rights programme, and this work, led by the Welsh Refugee Council and their partners, will provide quality advice and support for refugees and asylum seekers in a wide range of circumstances. I’ve also provided funding for the resettlement of vulnerable children under the Dubs scheme, and I, like Julie Morgan, am also disappointed about the closure of that scheme by the UK Government. This will support the capacity building in social services departments to ensure they can respond to the needs of these children, and these children are children, as Suzy Davies pointed out.

The Welsh Government also provides funding for the Refugee Well Housing Project, supporting individuals who have been granted refugee status to integrate into Welsh society. Additional funding has recently been invested in training mental health clinicians in treating PTSD in child and adult refugees and asylum seekers. The committee produced a number of recommendations relating to the devolved matters, and I will pick those up now.

I recognise the committee’s concern about the emergence of a two-tier system since the introduction of the Syrian refugee programme. We will do everything we can to minimise this, working to ensure all refugees are eligible to access integrated schemes in Wales, although we are constrained, again, by the UK Government funding conditions. We have to work within those constraints, but we will do what we can to help there.

We’ve already expanded the remit of the Wales refugee and asylum seekers taskforce and operations board, and we’ll be careful to ensure that any schemes and guidance we produce, including the delivery plan and community cohesion plan, meet the circumstances of all refugee groups as far as possible.

We recognise that the provision, also, of English for speakers of other languages is critical for the integration of refugees and asylum seekers, and we will update the ESOL policy by March 2018, and work with the Wales Strategic Migration Partnership’s ESOL co-ordination, to map formal and informal provision and identify barriers and the solutions, indeed, to accessing learning.

Will you give way?

One second; I will. Of course, where appropriate, we will also encourage refugees to access Welsh for adults provision, in that principle. On my visit to one of the centres in Cardiff, I did see volunteers working very hard, including refugees supporting other refugees, in the ESOL programme. I’ll take the intervention.

Can I just ask why it’s 2018? Because we heard from some witnesses who were saying that they were having to volunteer because there was simply nobody else to do it. Can we have some urgency in relation to potentially looking at this earlier because, at the moment, they’re so overstretched that I think this is something that warrants looking into?

I will take note of the Member’s contribution, and I will write to the Member in terms of the detail of why we came up with the 2018 date. It is something to do with the funding streams around that, but I will look at that more carefully.

I also accept the principles behind the committee’s recommendations regarding guardianship, the guardianship service and a destitution fund. We will explore if these schemes are available and desirable, with reference to developments in other parts of the UK and the distinctive Welsh context around that also.

I haven’t picked up Members’ contributions in detail today, other than I wanted to pick up the contribution by Gareth Bennett, in his contribution. I was surprised by his contribution. Where he said other people will be forced down the list to support housing refugees, can I say this is a myth? It’s complete rubbish, and I would hope that the Member would not use that contribution again. The generalisation of refugees, as Gareth Bennett has done today, is dangerous, is ill-informed and offensive. I must say, Dirprwy Lywydd, do we think that these children who find themselves in rubber dinghies, moving across oceans and the most dangerous seas, take this lightly and go by choice? Often fleeing conflict, war and genocide, they have to look for a safe haven, and I’m surprised at the Member’s contribution here today.

Finally, I strongly support the concept of developing Wales as a nation of sanctuary. However, without control of immigration policy, it would be extremely difficult to achieve some of the ‘Seven Steps to Sanctuary’, but in terms of this, set out by the Welsh Refugee Coalition, I will work with them to see what we can do to try and overcome some of those issues. It’s not through not wishing to participate. Nevertheless, as part of the process of developing our new delivery plan, we will explore issues further to determine what progress can be made. We’ve already made significant progress towards meeting these recommendations and we’ll continue to do so in the coming months.

Just picking up, finally, on one of the points with regard to the right-to-rent checks in Wales, I share the Members’ concerns—both Julie Morgan and Rhianon Passmore. I’ve written to the UK Government to ask them to evaluate the scheme. I am still awaiting a response to my letters from the UK Government, and I will pursue that with my diary team.

Would you just take an intervention? I’m really concerned—

Happy to do so.

[Continues.]—about the relationship between the Welsh Government and the UK Government, about this private contract for housing and the lack of regulation of these landlords, because it’s not a landlord tenancy contract. And I just wondered if you could say a little bit more about that.

Following on from the discussions I’d had previously with Bethan Jenkins in terms of whether we could include these within the Rent Smart Wales scheme, I’ve asked my team to give me further advice about where this might just fit in, to see whether there is more regulation that we can impose on this principle. But as Bethan Jenkins did mention, we have had discussions with some local authorities who are now pursuing this around the issues of acceptable places to live. I will update Members when I have some more information regarding that.

Finally, Wales is enriched by the diversity of cultures being resettled here, and we will continue to embrace that. Diolch.

Thank you very much. I call on the Chair of the committee, John Griffiths, to reply to the debate.

Diolch yn fawr, Dirprwy Lywydd. I will not be able to deal with all points, as only a limited amount of time is available to me, but can I begin by very much welcoming the wide-ranging and passionate debate we have heard this afternoon? I do believe it’s reflective of the importance of these issues, and also reflective of the commitment that committee members and clerks, and those who gave evidence and engaged with the committee’s work, demonstrated in addressing these issues and helping us to develop possible ways forward. I think it’s a great testament, actually, to Wales as a whole that what we have found across the country, in taking evidence and making visits, is communities really wanting to welcome refugees and asylum seekers to Wales, and wanting to support them when they are here. When there’s that personal contact—you know, host community, as it were, refugees and asylum seekers—stereotypes and myths very quickly break down, and it’s been a very encouraging and positive experience.

I’d very much like to thank Suzy Davies for highlighting some of the issues around preparedness of local authorities. I think we did find that there were communication difficulties there that need to be resolved, and there’s further work to be done on that. Bethan showed great commitment and passion around accommodation issues, and indeed the issues in general, which brought real urgency and, I believe, effectiveness to the work of the committee. A lot of the issues around English for speakers of other languages and the flexibility are crucially important, because obviously if you haven’t got the standard of English that is necessary to fully function as a citizen here, then it restricts you in terms of employment, in terms of volunteering, in terms of understanding the services that are available and making necessary communication. So that, I think, overlays everything that we’ve heard and everything that we’d like to see done.

Jenny, the Oasis centre in Splott was hugely uplifting, and the commitment from volunteers, as you mentioned, was heart-warming, I think, to us all. Joyce, again, the commitment to children and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and the guardianship issues through your work on the cross-party group and on this committee is very, very important.

I think Julie Morgan, in pointing to these issues around being able to work, not being able to work, the restrictions involved, really went to the heart of much of what we heard, and indeed gave the title to the report—’I used to be someone’—because these people have so much experience, and such high-level skills, they offer so much, and it’s a great shame that there are these restrictions in place that stop that great offer to Wales coming to fruition in the timely way that it should.

Rhianon, on communication strategy, I think we were very impressed with Scotland and what they are doing to break down these stereotypes and myths, and the way that they refer to asylum seekers and refugees coming to Scotland as ‘new Scots’ I think was very, very positive, and they have built so much around that.

Gareth—I, too, as the Cabinet Secretary, regret Gareth Bennett’s remarks. I think the idea that we should somehow ensure standards of accommodation are lower than those generally available in Wales is wrong-headed in all ways. The idea that people experiencing war, persecution, and displacement are researching policies in countries around the world to choose which one they may go to on the basis of the largesse available, and those perceptions, is far-fetched in the extreme.

Dirprwy Lywydd, I can see that my time has come to a close, but can I just thank all Members who have contributed, and the Cabinet Secretary for his response? The committee now looks forward to working with the Cabinet Secretary over the months and years to come, and all the stakeholders, to make sure that commitments made by Welsh Government are delivered and help our communities support people seeking safety in what I hope will become our nation of sanctuary.

Thank you very much. The proposal is to note the committee’s report. Does any Member object? Therefore that motion is agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.

Motion agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.