Responding to a Government announcement that former Afghan staff and family members eligible for the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy will be given indefinite leave to remain in the UK, Steve Valdez-Symonds, Refugee and Migrant Rights Director at Amnesty International UK, said:

“Granting indefinite leave to remain immediately to Afghans needing to rebuild their lives in the UK is a sensible and supportive approach.

“Providing people with certainty about their future gives confidence to them and others - such as prospective employers - to invest in that too.

“However, while ministers are doing the right thing here, they are doing the exact opposite with the Nationality and Borders Bill - instead, they’re imposing prolonged uncertainty on many refugees who are also entitled to stay because of the persecution from which they’ve fled.

“This is not only bad for refugees and communities – it’s bad for the entire asylum system, with ever-greater backlogs and people being required to make repeated applications to renew their permission to stay.”