Margaret Ritchie – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Margaret Ritchie on 2016-04-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to extend the Vulnerable Persons Relocation Scheme to (a) Iraqi victims of Daesh and (b) members of the Yazidi community.

James Brokenshire

Only UNHCR registered Syrian refugees are eligible under the Syrian Resettlement Scheme, which has been expanded to resettle up to 20,000 during this Parliament. We work closely with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to identify cases that they deem in need of resettlement according to seven agreed vulnerability criteria for the Syrian Resettlement Scheme.

There are no current plans to widen the Syrian Resettlement Scheme but it is operated in addition to our global resettlement schemes: Gateway and Mandate, which are not nationality specific.