A SAFE HAVEN FOR SYRIANS
HOW THE UK HAS RESETTLED MORE THAN HALF OF ITS 2020 SYRIAN REFUGEE TARGET
S OME 13 Syrian refugees were resettled in the UK every day last year. That means the country has fulfilled more than half the number of people it aims to resettle by 2020.
The Syrian Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme (VPRS) was launched at the start of 2014 with the aim of providing sanctuary to several hundred vulnerable Syrians across three years.
In 2015, then Prime Minister David Cameron announced plans to expand the service, re settling a total of 20,000 Syrian refugees by 2020. The Home Office announced in the summer of 2017 that the scope of the scheme would be expanded to include other refugees without Syrian nationality who had fled the Syrian conflict. By the end of 2017 some 10,538 people had been resettled since the scheme began. That year alone, 4,832 people were resettled under the VPRS across 234 different local authorities. Nearly half - 2,405 - were children. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) works with the UK government to assess which refugees are in greatest need of help and prioritises women and children at risk, people in severe need of medical care and survivors of torture and violence.
Home Secretary Amber Rudd said: “I went to Lebanon to see for myself the human impact of the Syrian conflict and talk to refugees about the challenges they face.
“I met a family who is due to be resettled in the UK and heard first hand how important the resettlement scheme is and how it helps individuals, who have fled danger and conflict, to rebuild their lives.
“We are welcoming and supporting some of the most vulnerable refugees and I am grateful to all of the local authorities, charities and other organisations that have made it possible.”
Gonzalo Vargas Llosa, The UNHCR’s UK representative, said: “The UK has embarked on an impressive upscaling of the VPRS in a short period, setting in place structures to welcome highly vulnerable refugees and allowing them to gradually stand on their own feet again.”
Stephen Hale, chief executive of Refugee Action, the largest provider of resettlement support for refugees arriving through the scheme, said: “We welcome the Home Secretary’s assertion that we will need to do more. “We’re in the middle of the worst refugee crisis on record - 1.2 million refugees are in need of resettlement worldwide. “It’s unacceptable that Britain’s other, long-term resettlement programme, for refugees of all nationalities, has remained static at around 800 for almost a decade. “Expanding resettlement to welcome at least 10,000 refugees each year, regardless of which emergency they’ve fled, and giving them equal rights and support, would far better reflect the contribution we should be making and build on the success of the Syrian scheme post 2020.”