Robert Jenrick
MP for Newark · Reform UK · United Kingdom
“Robert Steele was a beautiful four-year-old boy who died three weeks ago in Newark when he was thrown from an off-road bike that was being driven by a 24-year-old man. This is the culmination of a number of incidents in my town, and many others across the country, involving off-road bikes, e-bikes and e-scooters.”
“The Minister said that Governments are elected to lead. Most people would assume that means that Ministers are elected to lead, because they are accountable to Parliament and to the people.”
“There is an air of total unreality hanging over this debate. Successive Governments have run down our Royal Navy to its present enfeebled state, they have conspired to surrender other British sovereign territory and we have a Government who procrastinate about signing off a new oil field in the North sea—let alone about one in the south A…”
“I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his position. I have known him for a long time—I wish him well. He has a huge task ahead of him. Earlier in the summer, the Prime Minister said that walking the streets of Makerfield lodged in his mind that so many working people want to see the personal allowance raised.”
“Imagine that you are a worker at JLR worried about your future, and you have the misfortune of watching the Chancellor’s speech, which contains searing economic insights like, “I want to see businesses make a profit.” There was nothing about scrapping electric vehicle mandates, bringing down energy costs by getting rid of net zero targets…”
“The sight of the Government escorting illegal migrants into Portsmouth harbour, the home of the Royal Navy, was a national humiliation. Sometimes I wonder whether Members of this House have no appreciation of the level of anger there is in the country at the rapes, the murders and the billions being wasted that should be being spent on th…”
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“There is testing for those presenting with symptoms and for close contacts, and those testing positive are being isolated in a designated place. Today we are going above and beyond the UKHSA baseline by instituting new guidance on the transportation and accommodation of individuals displaying diphtheria symptoms. From today, no one presenting with symptoms will progress into the asylum accommodation system. They will either remain at Manston, isolating for a short period, or they will travel to a designated isolation centre in secure transport, where they will be treated until deemed medically fit. This is a well-practised protocol from covid times.”
“While these robust processes and plans for a situation of this type are already in train, it is absolutely right for us now to be vigilant: that is what the public would expect, and that is what we are doing. There are, for instance, robust screening processes on the arrival of individuals at Western Jet Foil in Dover to identify proactively those with symptoms of diphtheria; “round-the-clock” health facilities at Manston, including emergency department consultants and paramedics; guidance in multiple languages on spotting the symptoms of diphtheria; and an enhanced diphtheria vaccination programme, offered to all those arriving at Manston. I can confirm that of those who arrived at the facility this weekend, 100% took up that vaccine offer.”
“It is important to emphasise that the UKHSA has made it clear that the risk to the wider UK population from onward transmission of diphtheria is very low, thanks in no small part to our excellent childhood immunisation programme, and also because the infection is typically passed on through close prolonged contact with a case. The UKHSA confirmed that it considers it likely that these cases developed before they entered the UK. The Home Office has worked closely with the NHS and the UKHSA to identify and isolate anyone with a diphtheria infection. That includes providing diphtheria vaccinations and moving confirmed cases into isolation.”
“There has been speculation about the wider health implications across the asylum accommodation system, so I wanted to come to the House to set out the facts, to outline the steps that have already been taken to protect migrants and the general public, and to reassure the public about the additional precautionary measures that we are now taking. The control and testing of infectious diseases is led by the UK Health Security Agency and the Department for Health and Social Care. The Home Office continues to work closely with both, taking their advice on all these matters and following it. As part of our ongoing dialogue, the Home Secretary and I were updated on the situation over the weekend by Dame Jenny Harries of the UKHSA, who confirmed to us that 50 cases of diphtheria had been reported in asylum accommodation.”
“May I extend my apologies, on behalf of the Department, to the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper)—and, indeed, to you, Mr Speaker—for the delay in providing a copy of the statement? With your permission, however, I will now make a statement about the public health considerations in asylum accommodation. As the House will know, on the morning of 19 November an individual who had arrived in the United Kingdom on 12 November, and who had been staying at the Manston processing site, sadly died in hospital. Initial test results for an infectious disease were negative, but a follow-up PCR test was positive. We must now await the post mortem results to determine the cause of death, and our thoughts are with the individual’s family.”
“Those local public health directors will work with local NHS partners to ensure that the individuals have treatment under the NHS and that they isolate in their rooms within those hotels or other forms of accommodation. The outsourced partners will ensure that the people have food and laundry brought to the door, so that there is no reason whatsoever that they should leave their room until they are well again and can re-enter broader society. If there are further measures that we need to take, we will do so. Dame Jenny and her colleagues are meeting directors of public health this week, as they have been doing repeatedly in recent months, to hear their concerns and ensure that these procedures are progressively improved as required.”
“Dame Jenny and her colleagues will advise on that. We have had the vaccination programme in operation for a number of weeks. It is a voluntary programme; we do not compel migrants to take it up. It began at a relatively low level of acceptance—about 45%—but that is now increasing; as I said, I am pleased to say that we have reached 100% for those who came over the weekend. We will do everything we can to maintain it at or around that level, because that clearly is a very important line of defence. For those individuals who have already left Manston and have flowed into asylum accommodation elsewhere in the country, we and the UKHSA are now going to work closely with local directors of public health to ensure that they have the right guidance to protect those individuals.”
“For that reason, we will be ensuring that further individuals who have any symptoms are not transported around the country; they will either remain at Manston or go to specialist accommodation. That accommodation is readily available, because we made good use of it during the height of the covid pandemic and we will be making sure it is brought into use in the coming days. The right hon. Lady asked about screening arrangements. Those have been in place for some time. All individuals arriving at Western Jet Foil are screened. That is, by necessity, a relatively simple screening, because on occasion thousands of illegal migrants arrive in the course of a single day, but screening is followed up at Manston and we have asked the UKHSA to advise us on whether further measures are required to ensure that that screening is more sophisticated.”
“I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for those questions. She asked how long we have been aware of diphtheria cases. When I addressed the House for the first time, on 1 November, I reported that there had been four cases. I am able now to say that that has increased to 50 cases, and I will continue to update the House as this issue develops. The right hon. Lady asked whether Ministers have followed the advice of the UK Health Security Agency throughout. To the best of my knowledge, they have. We have always sought and followed the advice of Dame Jenny Harries and her colleagues. In fact, the measures I have announced today go beyond the UKHSA’s baseline advice, because we want to take a precautionary approach.”
“It is for those reasons that I took the decision today that no asylum seeker will leave Manston if they are displaying any symptoms whatsoever of diphtheria, or indeed of other serious infectious diseases. They will either remain there or, more likely, be taken to one of our secure isolation hotels—the type of hotel that we used during the covid pandemic. They will remain there and will not leave while they are being treated. Hopefully, they will make a full recovery and then they will be transported to other accommodation elsewhere in the country. I think that is the right approach. It goes beyond the advice that Dame Jenny and her colleagues at the UKHSA have provided to us, because I want to ensure that we are doing absolutely everything we can to take this issue seriously.”
“It is important that we work with directors of public health to put in place the correct procedures in the community so that they can identify people, get them the treatment they need, vaccinate them where appropriate and ensure they are properly isolated. Finally, the hon. Gentleman asked a valid question that I too have asked of our advisers: is there a simple test we can apply to all those with diphtheria? It is the advice of Dame Jenny and UKHSA that there is not a lateral flow-style test that could be applied to all individuals while they are at Manston that would provide any degree of accuracy. However, we will be screening people thoroughly and, if there are any symptoms, they will be put into this new procedure.”
“Now that the number of cases is somewhat higher, it is clear that we have to up the response, which is why we are now ensuring that no one with symptoms leaves our care at Manston or at the accompanying secure hotel. It does mean that we need to ensure that the right data flows with the individuals—I think that is the point he was making—so that, if migrants arrive in a particular location, the directors of public health and the local NHS know as much as is possible about their pre-existing medical conditions, given the cohort of people. Now that we are operating Manston in the way that I would wish, meaning that individuals flow through it within a matter of hours, fewer people will be detected at Manston because they will be there for far shorter periods.”
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for those important questions. The most important point to stress is that the advice of the UKHSA has been followed throughout. With any emerging health issue, the response has to be dictated by medical advice and the response has to increase along with the issue and the challenge. That is exactly the approach we have taken. When there were a very small number of cases, the approach of the UKHSA was that we screened individuals, that we provided medication and support for those who had symptoms, and that we ensured that the directors of public health in the community knew how to treat those people who responded later on with symptoms.”
“Friend is right to draw the parallel with covid, in that the public will rightly expect that individuals entering the UK should be kept in close quarters while they have infectious diseases, and not be released into the broader population. That is why we have implemented these measures. If we need to go further, he can be assured that we will.”
“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his constructive approach to this difficult issue. We will be ensuring that correct screening is in place; as I said earlier, I have asked Dame Jenny whether there are even more screening procedures that we need to put in place, what those might be and how we can do that as quickly as possible. At the moment, we are following the UKHSA advice to the letter. I have also asked Dame Jenny to work on monitoring other infectious diseases prevalent in northern France and in the countries from which some of the migrants are coming, and on whether that should guide the further vaccination or screening procedures put in place. My hon.”
“I would say, however, that people coming to this country illegally—whose lives we invariably save at sea, and whom we then clothe, feed, water and send to hotel accommodation—deserve of course to be treated with decency and humanity, but there are limits to that and we should not shirk from the fact that the UK is doing everything in its power to support these people.”
“That means that ensuring the appropriate checks are conducted, and that individuals flow out of Manston into appropriate accommodation within 24 hours, is very challenging, and we need to consider whether that is the right approach. But it is absolutely right, of course, that we abide by the law and that is what I have tried to do while I have been in the Department. I will not get into discussing the legal advice that we have received or the judicial reviews that the right hon. Lady refers to.”
“I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her kind words. It has always been my approach, from day one, to ensure that Manston is brought into a legal and decent state. I am pleased to say that that is, broadly speaking, where we are today thanks to the hard work of Border Force officers, immigration enforcement and our partners at Manston. It is a difficult task managing a site such as Manston because of the sheer numbers of people crossing the channel and the irregularity with which they come. Even in my short tenure in the Department, I have seen that we can go for days in which no one comes, and then we can have two or three days in which 2,000 or 3,000 people come.”
“The UKHSA’s advice to me is that the risk to the broader UK population is very low because of the high prevalence of our vaccination programme—over 90% of the British public has been vaccinated for diphtheria. But my hon. Friend, who represents so many people who work at Western Jet Foil and Manston, is right to say that we should be particularly careful to protect people who do that difficult and important work. I will follow up with my officials, and indeed with the outsourcing providers that run our hotels and other asylum accommodation, to make sure that we have all the right procedures in place to protect those people, who are doing an absolutely fantastic job and impress me on every occasion that I meet them.”
“I am afraid that the connection that the right hon. Lady seeks to draw is not correct. We do not take this issue lightly, and we will continue to follow it and to put in place whatever measures we need to.”
“I respect the right hon. Lady’s point of view and experience, but it has not taken a death for the Home Office to focus on this issue. This individual’s death is deeply regrettable, but we have been working on, and alive to, this issue for many months—indeed, for years. The Home Office has had in place procedures to deal with covid since the start of the pandemic. The hotels I mentioned earlier, which we will use to transfer people with diphtheria symptoms, were the locations the Home Office used for those who tested positive for covid. The UKHSA has been publishing guidance on the treatment and support of asylum seekers and refugees for many months—it may even be years. The latest guidance on this issue was published by Dame Jenny Harries and her colleagues two weeks ago, prior to the sad death of this individual.”
“As I said in answer to an earlier question, I have asked the UKHSA whether there are further screening measures that we should put in place. At the moment, we are meeting all the advice and guidance that it has provided, but if it makes further requests of us, we will of course do everything we can to facilitate those.”
“My hon. Friend is right that those arriving at Western Jet Foil frequently present with conditions, some of which have been picked up in the course of their travels. For example, it is striking how many people present with severe burns that they have received through the combination of salty water and diesel fuel in the dinghies. Those are the sort of difficult situations that our paramedics and medical professionals have to deal with immediately when people arrive, even before they get to Manston. We have already put in place a medical centre at Manston, which I believe my hon. Friend visited, and it is of a high standard. It regularly has doctors, paramedics and emergency department doctors, who are able to support people. We are in the process of building a larger facility, which will enable us to have better facilities still.”
“I would be happy to look into the example the hon. Lady has given. However, she may also have seen the advice I issued last week to Members of Parliament and local authorities, saying that no individual should be moved from Manston, or indeed now from one of the secure infectious disease centres, to a hotel or other form of accommodation in any part of the country unless the local authority has been informed of who is arriving and whether they have any pre-existing medical conditions. That information is now flowing. If the hon. Lady has examples to suggest that that is not the case and brings those to me, I will be more than happy to look into them.”
“That is an important point, because we aspire to be in a position—indeed, we are now—where individuals spend a very short period of time at Manston, then rapidly move into other accommodation, which places a greater burden on the local NHS and the local authority in that area. We are providing further guidance, in addition to that published by the UKHSA two weeks ago, which will set out what we are asking of those communities. I hope there will be a two-way conversation, so if further support, information or resources are required from central Government to meet those requirements, then of course I will endeavour to provide them.”
“It may well be the case that many of them picked them up in the genuinely disgraceful conditions in some of the camps in northern France.”
“On a number of visits I have gone into great detail about the quality of care that we provide to migrants and seen incredibly hard-working people, from Border Force and our agencies, going above and beyond, providing Aptamil baby milk and powder, so that young mums can look after their children, providing a broad range of sanitary products for women, and ensuring that men have all the necessary items they need to shave and look after their health and wellbeing. The quality of care is good. Of course, there are things that we could do better, but we should not make the UK out to be a villain here. In fact the advice from the UKHSA is that the vast majority of the individuals who have infectious diseases contracted them overseas.”
“I am the Minister for Immigration, so it is perfectly logical that I come to the House and answer questions on this area. We provide clothing to migrants when they arrive at Western Jet Foil and while they are at Manston, so it is not correct that migrants would ever go to an area of the country, such as the one that the hon. Gentleman represents, without clothing. I have seen that clothing and it is perfectly acceptable. I am not quite sure what he is expecting us to provide to migrants over and above that—we look after people to the absolute best of our ability.”
“I am aware of my hon. Friend’s concern and am happy to look into it. From my prior experience in local government, I think it is not unusual for multi-agency meetings to be official meetings; that is how, for example, a local resilience forum would operate in the case of floods or other serious incidents. It is not ordinary practice for the political leaders of local authorities—or indeed, Members of Parliament—to be part of multi-agency meetings. That does not mean that we should not adapt those processes. As far as I am aware, the instruction that my hon. Friend has received has not come from the Home Office—it certainly has not come from me. I will look into the issue, and if I can change that, I certainly will.”
“I was not aware of that, but if the hon. and learned Lady gives me a copy of the letter—I think she has it in her hand—I will ensure that there is a swift and full response to it. On the conditions at Manston, I have said this before and will say it again—this is not in any sense to diminish the concerns that the hon. and learned Lady may have set out in the letter. The greatest service that she and her colleagues in Scotland could do on this issue would be to encourage more Scottish local authorities to take asylum seekers into their care. Scotland takes a disproportionately lower share of the burden of this issue in each of our resettlement and asylum schemes.”
“My hon. Friend is right. My approach from the start has been, first, to ensure that Manston is a legal and decent site; that has involved taking on other accommodation elsewhere in the country to meet our legal obligations. Secondly, it has been to ensure that we begin to exit those hotels and move asylum seekers to better accommodation, which would be simple and decent but not luxurious, and that we never find ourselves again in the position of using three and four-star hotels, stately homes and so, on for this purpose—”
“The right hon. Lady says not stately homes. Unfortunately, there are stately homes being used for this purpose. That is an outrage and we need to change it. My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) is absolutely right: these are the symptoms of the problem, but the cause is that far too many people are making these perilous journeys. We need to tackle the gangs that ensure that those journeys continue.”
“Manston, of course, can improve, but today we have a good medical facility, we are screening individuals and we are providing vaccinations. I have set out further measures that I will implement this week, and I will follow health advice if those need to be increased in future.”
“With respect to the hon. Lady, I did not say that the Home Office had allowed infectious diseases such as diphtheria to spread through the camp at Manston; I said that the clear advice from the UK Health and Safety Authority was that it was unlikely that those cases had been contracted at Manston and that in the vast majority of instances, if not all, it was most likely, although difficult to prove, that the individuals brought these infectious diseases to the UK as part of their illegal journey here. The UK has good procedures in this area. One only has to go and look at the camps in places such as Dunkirk to see the difference between the quality of care that the UK provides and that of some of our European neighbours.”
“I have now held a meeting with all local authorities in Wales and across the United Kingdom, and later this week I am rescheduling the meeting to which representatives from the Welsh Local Government Association are invited. That was the meeting I unfortunately had to cancel because the Opposition held an urgent question.”
“The hon. Lady raises an important point. No doubt it is correct that there will be wide variances across the country, and I will raise that point with the Dame Jenny Harries and the UK Health Security Agency, if I may, and one of us will write back to her with our national strategy.”
“As I said in answer to earlier questions, there are thorough screening procedures, both immediately on arrival in Dover and then later at Manston. There is an extensive medical facility at Manston, where anyone presenting with symptoms of diphtheria or any other condition can get access to medical care. That is designed to ensure that they have good care, but also to put as little pressure on the local NHS in Kent as possible. It is frequent that individuals go to local GP surgeries or emergency departments in hospitals, and we make sure that they have access to the NHS, as any member of British society would do.”
“It is for that reason that we have made the changes we have already. If there are further changes to be made, I will make them in the coming days.”
“The site is operating legally now. The current law allows the Home Secretary to detain individuals for 24 hours, save in exceptional circumstances. At the moment, the site has few individuals present at all, and those people are processed, have their biometrics taken for security purposes and flow out into contingency accommodation very rapidly. As I said in answer to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), it is not simple when there are large numbers of people in a very short period. That is the nature of the problem. There is very little that the Government could do to plan a processing centre that was able to flow 2,000, 3,000 or 4,000 people through its doors within a matter of hours. That is the challenge we have been grappling with.”
“Members on both sides of the House in recent weeks, and to agree new standards of engagement and conduct from them. These new standards will lead to a modest improvement, but I am clear that much more needs to be done, so this performance standard will be reviewed weekly with a view to improving service levels progressively as quickly as we can. In the medium term, we are committed to moving to a full dispersal accommodation model, which would be fairer and cheaper. We continue to pursue larger accommodation sites that are decent but not luxurious, because we want to make sure that those in our care are supported appropriately but that the UK is a less attractive destination for asylum shoppers and economic migrants. That is exactly what the Home Secretary and I intend to achieve.”
“On Monday, a “Dear colleague” letter in my name was sent to outline a new set of minimum requirements for that engagement, backed by additional resources. This includes an email notification to local authorities and Members of Parliament no less than 24 hours prior to arrivals; a fulsome briefing on the relevant cohort, required support and dedicated point of contact; and an offer of a meeting with the local authority as soon as possible prior to arrival. I have since met chief executives and leaders of local authorities across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, among many other meetings, to improve our engagement. We discussed their concerns and outlined the changes that we intend to make together. I have also met our providers to convey my concerns and those conveyed to me by hon.”
“That would not have been possible without the work of dedicated officials across the Home Office—from the officials in cutters saving lives at sea, to the medical staff at Manston—and I put on record my sincere gratitude to them for the intense effort required to achieve that result. To bring Manston to a sustainable footing and meet our legal and statutory duties to asylum seekers who would otherwise have been left destitute, we have had to procure additional contingency accommodation at extreme pace. In some instances, however, that has led to the Home Office and our providers failing to properly engage with local authorities and Members of Parliament. I have been clear that that is completely unacceptable and that it must change.”
“On my appointment by the Prime Minister three weeks ago, I was appraised of the critical situation at the Manston processing centre. Within days, the situation escalated further with a terrorist attack at Western Jet Foil that forced the transfer of hundreds of additional migrants to Manston. I urgently visited Western Jet Foil and Manston within days of my appointment to assess the situation for myself and to speak with frontline staff, during which time it became clear to me that very urgent action was required. Since then, the numbers at Manston have fallen from more than 4,000 to zero today.”
“That is exactly what I intend to achieve.”
“For information, had that proposition been taken forward, it would have been for a very small number of individuals. At the moment, there are 39 asylum seekers accommodated in my hon. Friend’s constituency, 14 of whom are in hotels and 25 in dispersed accommodation. That accounts for 0.02% of the population of Tendring’s local authority. I do not say that to diminish the legitimate concerns that he raises, but merely to provide context. If we are dealing with 40,000 individuals crossing the channel illegally, there will be a need for all local authorities in the country to work with the Home Office and to play their part. It is absolutely incumbent on the Home Office in return, however, to provide good standards of engagement so that we can ensure that the right accommodation is chosen in the right places.”
“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising those important issues. I will, of course, be happy to meet him, as I have met hon. Members on both sides of the House in almost every case where someone has requested to do so. In respect of the hotel in Tendring, as I understand it, having spoken to officials this morning, a proposition was put to Tendring District Council to use a former care home in my hon. Friend’s constituency, which would have accommodated a small number of asylum seekers. Short notice was given because it was to be a backstop accommodation option in the light of the extreme situation that we were contending with at Manston. On further inquiries, and prior to his inquiry to the Department and the calling of the urgent question, the proposition was dropped by the Home Office and there is no intention of proceeding with it.”
“Their own leader, in his leadership campaign, called for the closure of immigration removal centres—the places where we detain people, often foreign national offenders, while we are trying to get them out of the country. The truth is that, in the last Labour Government, the party was committed to mass migration and uncontrolled immigration. We are only the party that believes in the British public. We are the party that wants to ensure that we secure our borders and have a controlled migration system.”
“Dear me! The reason I had to pull out of the meeting with local authority leaders was that the hon. Gentleman had called an urgent question and I was here answering his questions. The idea that the Labour party knows how to get a grip of this challenge is, frankly, laughable. The last Labour Government left the Home Office in such disarray that their own Home Secretary declared it not fit for purpose and had to split the place up. The backlog of cases was so high that he had to institute an amnesty, where they literally wrote to people and said, “Welcome to Britain. We can’t process your application—you’re in.” That is not the approach that we are taking. Labour Members have no credible proposals to stop the problem at source. They voted against the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, and they opposed the Rwanda scheme.”
“We will do it in a number of different ways, including through dispersal accommodation with local authorities; through judicious use of hotels, with good engagement with local authorities; by using larger sites that provide us with decent but not luxurious accommodation; and, of course, by tackling the problem at source. We cannot build our way out of this challenge. We have to reduce the pull factors to the UK and we have to ensure that the backlog of cases is cleared as swiftly as possible.”
“I can only speak to the situation as I found it when I arrived in the Department, and at that point there were almost 4,000 people at the Manston site. There were serious concerns about conditions at the site and, indeed, about its legality, and there was insufficient accommodation available to us to house the asylum seekers. We have set out, through immense efforts in the last few weeks, to rectify that situation. It is clear to me that insufficient accommodation was procured over a sustained period, and we need to tackle that.”