"Very mean": Chelmsford council leader on the government's handling of the Ukraine refugee crisis
He wants the government to relax their visa requirements
The leader of Chelmsford City Council has criticised the government over their handling of the Ukrainian refugee crisis, saying it's "mean" and that a lack of advice from central government is preventing them from helping refugees.
Stephen Robinson, council leader, says the government needs to relax its visa requirements for those fleeing Ukraine: "The scheme itself needs to be widened so that all Ukrainians who are fleeing violence are eligible to come to United Kingdom.
"Unfortunately, and sadly, the UK's response to date has been very mean, only letting in people who can demonstrate a clear family connection - and even those people have struggled to get visas.
"We've seen families being turned away from visa offices in France because they hadn't got the correct paperwork!
"The United Kingdom just needs to be more welcoming and step up like other countries in Europe have done."
The councillor says Chelmsford City Council want to help as many refugees as possible: "The city council wants to do whatever it can to help, but at the moment we're distinctly lacking information from the government about who might be arriving and when.
"This has similarities with what happened in August when Afghan families arrived and the information from central government was also lacking.
"Unfortunately central government has a habit of making announcements but not following up with the details very quickly."
He says it's hard for them to plan their assistance without guidance: "It's almost impossible to plan because we don't know who's coming, we don't know when, we don't know how many and we don't know whether we're talking about families or individuals."
'Home for Ukraine', a government scheme enabling people to host Ukrainian refugees in their homes was launched last Monday, however Stephen says it's not well organised: "Encouraging families to offer up their house is a great initiative, but we're already hearing that people want to offer up their house, but have no idea how they find a family to come and live in that house."
He says that getting Ukrainians into the country is one issue, but once they're here, settling them is another issue the government must offer further advice on as soon as possible: "It's really important that families that have been through an awful lot of trauma get the right support.
"It's not just about providing them with a home, it's providing them with counselling and, if there's young children, schooling, and establishing whether these families have a right to remain in the United Kingdom long term or whether they've been given temporary visas.
"All of these questions need to be clarified."
So far more than 138,000 households across the UK have registered interest in opening their home to refugees.
In response to the councillor's comments, the Department for Levelling Up said:
• As the Secretary of State said in the House this week: “We are building on arrangements that we have with the LGA, and I have been in touch with James Jamieson, the leader of the LGA, as well as individual council leaders, to outline the level of support. Obviously, we will keep things under review to ensure that local government has what it needs.”
• Councils have a vast amount of knowledge and experience of welcoming new arrivals, offering homes and supporting families and individuals to build new lives in communities across the UK.
• We have engaged with a number of councils in the lead up to the sponsorship scheme being launched and they are keen to play their part, both in the co-design and delivery of the scheme.
• Councils have a huge range of expertise and learning from resettlement programmes and will play a vital role in the support offered to Ukrainians settling into the UK. We will continue to work closely with councils and the LGA over the coming days and weeks.