Refugees: Children
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will take steps to enable children brought to the UK by the UNHCR to be reunited with their parents.
Answered by Seema Malhotra
Keeping families together as part of the resettlement process is a priority. Children resettled through the UK Resettlement Scheme will usually arrive in the UK with their parents or carers.
As part of UNHCR’s assessment, UNHCR will first seek to reunify unaccompanied children with parents or family members within the host region or wherever their family members may be. For unaccompanied children, UNHCR will refer a child to the UK or another participating State should they consider that it would be in the child’s best interest to be resettled.
The government provides a safe and legal route to bring families together through its refugee family reunion policy. This allows individuals with protection status in the UK to sponsor their partner or children to reunite with them, provided they formed part of the family unit before their sponsor fled the country of their habitual residence in order to seek protection. We will seek to ensure that this route works effectively.
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