To receive any petitions, deputations or questions received from members of the public in accordance with the provisions of Procedure Rule 28. The total time allowed for this is 30 minutes.  Petitions, deputations and questions will be dealt with in the order in which they are received and any which are not considered within the time limit shall receive a written response after the meeting.

A deputation was received from Mrs R Mayho as printed below:

I am Rosalyn Mayho and am here with members, attenders and friends of Oakham Friends Meeting House and local members of Amnesty International.  We are supporting the work of Safe Passage, a charity whose mission is to provide unaccompanied child refugees safe and legal routes to the UK. 

Safe Passage, and other individuals and charities concerned with asylum seekers and refugees are working to ensure that following Brexit and the end of the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme in 2020, the UK government has something in place for these voiceless youngsters.  David Cameron pledged places for 22,000 people to be resettled by 2020 through a fully funded central government scheme, the VPRS; and indeed, we are on track to resettle 23,000 Syrians by 2020.  However there is nothing yet in place following Brexit and the 2020 deadline to ensure Britain continues to receive refugees. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; last year there were 63 million people worldwide fleeing war and terror.   The UNHCR has calculated that the UK has the capacity \ responsibility to resettle a further 10,000 people from 2020-30. That is only 1,000 a year for ten years.  To put it in perspective, before the beginning of World War 1 Britain took in over 250,000 refugees fleeing Belgium, most arriving in small boats.  In fact, in Ketton there are a couple of houses next door to the post office, where Belgium refugees were housed during WW1.  Again,  in 1938 -39, in just over one year during yet another period of major political upheaval, the UK resettled 10,000 children. 

 In June this year Lord Dubs visited refugee camps in Lesbos, Greece, where children have arrived from Turkey.  He said of his visit “I am still haunted by what I saw.”  He described the camps as being as bad as the “Calais Jungle,” these people have no means of release unless some other country is prepared to help them, he described them as virtually prison camps.

This is the 80^th anniversary of the Kindertransport when Britain took in 10,000 unaccompanied children from Czechoslovakia and Germany.    Lord Dubs was one of the children who arrived in Britain on one of those trains.  It saved his life – and he now passionately believes that we once more step up to the plate.  Rural communities could do it 100 years ago, we are sure we can do it again.

We, as members of the Rutland community, are asking our County Council as a matter of urgency, to lobby parliament to show core humanity and compassion by funding a new scheme within the local government framework to provide the appropriate infrastructure and support to properly enable unaccompanied child refugees to be resettled within the East Midlands Councils. 

Mr Foster, Portfolio Holder for Safeguarding - Children and Young People responded to the deputation as follows:

The Council is grateful to receive this deputation and I am sure that we whole heartedly agree that central government need to ensure that they properly fund a new scheme within the local government framework to provide the appropriate infrastructure and support to enable unaccompanied child refugees to be resettled within the East Midlands Councils to which Rutland belongs.

Here in Rutland we have a proud record of looking after unaccompanied young people, one such young person comes to mind who we were able to support through to gaining a University Degree, and we are determined to continue to provide support in the future to unaccompanied child refugees.  

Unless there is objection this evening then I will write to the appropriate Minister to make this clear.

During discussion the following points were noted:

·       Mr Foster confirmed that the topic of unaccompanied child refugees was a standing item on the East Midlands Councils Leaders for Childrens Services meeting; and

·       Mr Walters confirmed that he would also be taking this subject forward to the East Midlands Councils Migration Board of which he was the Council’s representative.