'Staggering complacency': Caroline Lucas confronts minister on missing child asylum seekers
Guardian, 25 Jan 2023
Green Party MP, Caroline Lucas accused the government of 'staggering complacency' after it was revealed that 200 child asylum-seekers went missing from hotel accommodation provided by the Home Office.
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In an urgent question, Lucas said, 'We need immediate answers, we need an urgent investigation. We need to ask how many more children are going to go missing before we actually see some action?' Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper, similarly accused the government of a 'dereliction of duty.'
Robert Jenrick, the immigration minister who took the urgent question told MPs that of 4,600 child asylum seekers who had arrived since 2021, 440 had gone missing, the majority of which were of Albanian origin. Jenrick also defended the government saying, it did not have the power to detain people, but was working to locate and ensure the safety of minors in government care, including an increase in the budget for local authorities.
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