Examination of witnesses (Questions 40
- 59)
TUESDAY 5 MAY 1998
THE RT
HON MR
ROBIN COOK,
MP, and MR
PETER WESTMACOTT
40. I am glad to hear it, maybe if we made
a specific recommendation the British Government should have responded
to that specific recommendation.
(Mr Cook) I cannot answer as to why it was not
listed in the response. It may be, since the response was primarily
drafted in DfID and this was an action taken in the FCO, it slipped
through the net somewhere.
41. Another joint venture.
(Mr Cook) I can assure you we are doing the things
which are the most important things.
42. Can you tell me how many Montserratians
have relocated to the United Kingdom since the volcano erupted
in July 1995?
(Mr Cook) I understand the figure is of the order
of 3,500, if I have got that figure correct. Some of them under
the early launch aid scheme and others under citizen capacity
scheme.
43. Can you tell us how many Montserratians
remain on Montserrat currently?
(Mr Cook) The actual figure which is publicly
quoted is almost 3,500, I think it is 3,462 if I remember rightly.
That does include a number of people who are registered as being
normally resident on Montserrat and who may not actually be there.
The actual figure of people on the island is probably of the order
of 3,000.
44. The initial two year grant of leave
to remain in the UK expired for the first evacuees in April of
this year. What is their current status?
(Mr Cook) You are quite right that the two year
period has now expired for some of those who arrived in the first
wave. We are actively engaged with the Home Office in looking
at what further extension can be provided and I would say to the
Committee that there is no question of anybody being required
to leave Britain. Their position will be secured. At the moment
there is undoubtedly a difficulty in status for those who have
now found that their two year period has expired, particularly
I understand that one or two of them have experienced difficulty
because they wish to travel abroad. We are willing to provide
travel documentation for them so they can do so until the issue
is resolved. I would not myself have any doubt whatsoever with
the outcome, we will be giving them the right to remain.
45. Their legal status is that they are
presumably overstayers?
(Mr Cook) I would hesitate to confer what is a
legal term but I can assure you that nobody is contemplating any
action against them and I can give you that assurance.
46. Can I ask you whether the people concerned
have been notified about the position that they are in?
(Mr Cook) I doubt if they have had any communication
because to be fair to those who would be responsible for making
such a communication, we would like to be clear what it is we
are offering to them before they receive the communication. A
communication which told them that their status here had expired
would not necessarily be welcome and might cause an alarm which
is unnecessary because nobody is contemplating any action.
Chairman
47. There have been ministerial statements
to the effect that should they relocate to this country they would
be permitted to stay for as long as they wished because there
would be those who have put their children into school and re-established
themselves here. I think they ought to be given an assurance that
that ministerial statement will be honoured.
(Mr Cook) I thought I had given that assurance.
That is exactly what I am saying. There is no question of them
being asked to leave, they will be allowed to remain here. By
the way I am advised that on the technical point they are not
overstayers if they have made an application to remain.
Mr Grant
48. What if they have not made an application
to remain?
(Mr Cook) I would hesitate to confirm that they
are overstayers because that, as you know, has a very clear legal
status. I have just assured both the Chair and the Committee that
nobody in the Government is contemplating any action in this case.
The fact that they have come to the end of the two years has no
practical impact on the fact that they have been encouraged to
remain here.
Mr Grant: I wonder
if we could have some note from the Foreign Office about the status[6].
Chairman
49. As soon as it has been resolved with
the Home Office. What concerns the Committee, Secretary of State,
is this, that your junior minister, Baroness Symons, said that
she has constantly been trying to get statements and commitments
from other ministries within Whitehall, including the Home Office
in this question, and has been unable to get a response which
does not give the Committee very much confidence in the new Whitehall
machinery co-ordinated by Baroness Symons.
(Mr Cook) To be fair the machinery, the Montserrat
Action Group—— Look, Chair, all I can say to you is
to repeat my assurance. I think it would be very unfortunate if
any message of alarm was to come out of this morning's hearing
to those people who are here. We recognise that they are here
and we recognise that at the moment there is a technical assurance.
I would stress we view it as a technical issue. There is no possibility
of any policy requirement for those people to leave. They have
come here because of a disaster. They have been accepted to Britain
because of the disaster. Nobody is going to require them to leave.
I want to make that assurance quite clear. As to when we can let
you have something in writing, I have to say that this is not
something that is within the sole gift of the Foreign Office.
Certainly we can let you have a note as soon as we can obtain
agreement with our colleagues in the Home Office.
50. You are responsible for Montserrat,
so presumably when you have resolved the technical difficulty
you will be in a position to let the Committee know.
(Mr Cook) I am definitely responsible for Montserrat
as an Overseas Territory. I have to say we have not got sole responsibility
for British immigration.
Chairman: No, we understand
that.
Dr Tonge
51. I am sorry, Secretary of State, but
this really takes me back to my original point again. I do not
think the people of our Overseas Territories are quite clear what
they are. I am not clear what they are and I think this has to
be resolved very soon. Either they are part of the United Kingdom
living overseas or they are people who are treated by the immigration
service as aliens, I think they are called or whatever. They seem
to fall between the two and nobody can make up their minds just
what they are, whether it is how we finance the countries, how
we treat the citizens of those countries. I think it very urgently
needs to be cleared up. For my part I would like to see them,
if they wish, being part of the United Kingdom, in the same way
as Scotland and Wales and run in similar lines, if the people
want it.
(Mr Cook) I can assure you on that point they
do not.
52. That is fine but we need to clear up
this dilemma.
(Mr Cook) I can clear it up for you. There is
no Dependent Territory that would opt for a status of integration
with the United Kingdom because in doing so they would lose the
enormously wide powers of self-determination and self-autonomy
that they currently enjoy. However on the specific question of
their rights as to citizenship, you will be aware in the speech
that I made in February, I outlined our willingness to explore
whether full British citizenship could be extended to the citizens
of the remaining Overseas Territories and currently we are engaged
in dialogue with the Home Office on that question. Two of them
do have British citizenship, Gibraltar and the Falklands and Gibraltar
of course is one of the much larger populations; the remainder
do not. Most of them contain populations with a good standard
of living, higher than in Britain, and a favourable environment.
There is no doubt though that in one or two cases, particularly
in Montserrat and St Helena, British citizenship would be of real
practical benefit. This is an issue that we are currently exploring
and we hope we will be able to give the outcome in the White Paper
that I promised in my speech.
Ann Clwyd
53. I have to say I still think it has been
quite a shabby way of treating Montserratians for people to come
to this country because they have been forced out of their own
country, they have experienced considerable difficulties, which
we have been through in the past meetings of the Committee, and
we felt that the Whitehall co-ordinating machinery was not working
too efficiently. I think this is a continuing example that the
dates where they should have been told what their status was have
passed and they have not been officially informed of their status.
I do not think that is a very good way to treat people at all.
(Mr Cook) Can I say that I think it is absolutely
fair to say that arrangements for the arrival of the people from
Montserrat at the beginning were not good enough, hence our current
discussion that goes back a period of two years. We have sought
to act to try and improve both the direct contact and service
to the people of Montserrat who are here and the co-ordination
of the various departmental responses to it. It is because of
that that we now do have a Home Office project focusing entirely
on integrating and assisting those who have come from Montserrat
to Britain. It does have a team of 18 full time staff doing nothing
else but tackling this issue, divided into three groups working
around Britain. They have already provided direct assistance and
counselling to over 500 households of those who have come here
who have continued difficulty. So I would certainly accept that
there have been problems in the past, but I would say that we
have made very serious efforts to get to grips with the issue
and now do have a specific theme and a specific project to try
and address the continuing needs.
Mr Grant
54. Just as an aside for a moment, the funding
for the Falklands, does that come out of the aid budget?
(Mr Cook) I have to say that there is no such
thing as just an aside about the Falklands, but to respond to
your question on the Falklands, the Falklands Government is self-financing
and the Falklands do actually have quite substantial resources
from fish and from oil licences and there is no government money
for the expenditure of the Government of the Falklands, although
of course we are heavily committed there with our military support.
55. Yes, but does that funding come from
the defence budget?
(Mr Cook) Yes.
56. It does not come from DfID or from the
Foreign Office?
(Mr Cook) No. Well, I would very stoutly resist
any suggestion that the Foreign Office should accept budgetary
responsibility for military posts abroad. That would transform
the relative balance of government aid.
57. Well, I do not know; there might be
some more on that in a few days' time. However, can I ask whether
there has been any progress made in identifying and assessing
and then advising Montserratians in the UK whose health might
have been affected by past exposure to ash?
(Mr Cook) Yes, we are very conscious of this issue
and the Department of Health is currently considering whether
to recommend health checks, such as X-rays. It is not necessary
or desirable for all Montserratians to be checked, but we are
looking at whether there should be a recommendation for it to
be repeated at five-year intervals. The Department of Health,
I understand, is considering screening a sample of Montserratians
in order to establish what the particular needs and requirements
might be.
58. Can I give you notice that I might be
raising a case, particularly on this issue, of a woman who stepped
into volcanic ash and whose legs have swollen up to thrice their
normal size, and her consultant has been trying to get her accommodation
in Britain and has not succeeded in getting adequate accommodation.
(Mr Cook) This is the woman who is currently in
the hospital at Montserrat? I have met her.
59. No, this is a woman who is over here.
(Mr Cook) I see. I am sorry, a different case.
Of course we would be very happy to respond to any individual
cases as sympathetically as we can.
6 Not herewith printed. Back
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