Monday 17 October 2016

Home Office to face High Court for failing to protect Calais migrant children

Calais migranat children

Home Office is now facing legal challenge in High Court for failing to protect Calais migrant children.

Two dozen children living in the camp without their parents are set to arrive in the UK in the next week but the legal action states the government has not done enough to protect unaccompanied children before French authorities demolish the Jungle.

The children are entitled to move to the UK under EU law which states that migrants must make a claim for asylum in the first European country they reach but children can transfer their claim to another country where family members are living.

Files lodged at the High Court criticised the government for failing to deliver a plan for moving the children and instead leaving it to charities to pick them up.

The documents state: "There is no functioning state system and what system there is, is currently almost entirely dependent on private actors."

The papers also revealed 111 children eligible to move to the UK are still stranded in squalid conditions across the Channel because of Home Office inefficiency.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd promised last week to accommodate as many migrant children as Britain can take.

It is not known how many of the unaccompanied minors will be brought over to Britain but of the estimated 1,000 unaccompanied children in the camp, it is believed 387 may be eligible to come to the UK, either because they have family in the country or it would be in their best interests.

However, the legal case states there has been a "longstanding failure by the defendant [Home Office] and the French authorities to identify and protect children".

The Home Office has until Tuesday to respond to case which claims it has failed in its "legal duties toward children" .

A High Court judge set the deadline acknowledging that French authorities have vowed to destroy the camp before the end of the year, moving migrants to other parts of the countries and deporting those who have not formally applied for asylum.

Officials from both countries have set up a registration system in the camp operating out of a recycled shipping container to move the children before the French administrations shuts it down.

The Home Office said "work is continuing on both sides of the Channel" to ensure unaccompanied children are moved "as a matter of urgency".


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