Home Secretary Priti Patel
(Picture: PA Wire)The Government faced fresh anger on Wednesday over its response to refugees fleeing Ukraine as Britons warned there could be riots at UK immigration centres unless ministers speed up the visa application process.
Marianne Kay, the daughter of a Ukrainian refugee from Yorkshire who is trying to help her 79-year-old mother to safety in the UK, told the BBC that a visa application centre set up by the British government in Rzeszow, Poland, was “severely” understaffed and said “it does feel like there will be riots”.
Meanwhile Luke Morgan, another Briton who is in Paris trying to secure safe passage for his Ukrainian wife’s family to come to Britain, told BBC Breakfast that he was “ashamed at the lack of support, the lack of humanity”. He added: “The lies and deceit are shameful.”
Ms Patel has been accused by senior Conservative MP Sir Roger Gale of misleading Parliament after she told MPs on Monday that a new visa processing centre was being set up in Calais.
Instead a new centre has been set up in Lille — nearly 70 miles away.
Wednesday Transport Secretary Grant Shapps was forced to defend the Government’s response and revealed that the UK has now granted 760 visas from a total of 22,000 applications under Britain’s Ukraine Family Scheme.
Mr Shapps refused to be drawn on whether Ms Patel misled MPs.
Asked if he was embarrassed about the visa situation, he said: “We want everything to work smoothly, of course. But you are dealing with a war situation.”
But with EU countries waiving usual checks to allow Ukrainians to stay for up to three years, the UK has been accused of not doing enough.
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper called for the Government to issue emergency visas.
She told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “Offer emergency visas that can be issued really swiftly, rather than people having to fill in these 14-page forms.
“It just beggars belief that people are being asked to do this when they have fled a war zone.”
