More on KentOnline
More on KentOnline
Health chiefs have expressed concerns that Brexit could lead to an increase in the number of vulnerable asylum seeker children reaching Kent.
A report by the South Kent Coast Clinical Commissioning Group - representing GPs in Folkestone, Dover and Deal - released under the Freedom of Information Act says:“Alternative light touch customs arrangements may see the return of the unprecedented number of Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children which caused significant issues in 2015.
"In addition, those who do not self-declare at the borders will disappear and are at significant risk of being exploited and trafficked throughout the UK.”
It goes on to suggest that an increase in numbers reaching Kent “risks health services being unable to meet the health need, increases the risk of the holistic health of our communities and places an increased burden on our already overstretched health economy.”
Figures indicate that there has in recent years been a sharp decline in so-called UASCs, from a high point in 2015, when Kent was looking after 948 children to a low of 152 in 2018.
The CCG report says the influx in 2015 “put significant strain on health resources and re-introduced communicable diseases the UK had managed to maintain through surveillance and vaccination programmes.”
It warns that if current agreements which see UK border officers carry out passport checks in Calais end after Brexit “the length of time it would take to process the population would lead to UASCs being without a legal status...increasing the safeguarding risks and the number of children going missing.”
"Endless promises have been made by successive immigration ministers and the Home Office..." Paul Carter
This arrangement - known as Le Touquet agreement - lies outside the scope of the EU as it only involves the UK and France.
The challenges of coping with vulnerable asylum seeker children were underlined by the Kent Safeguarding Children’s Board in its annual report last year, in which it said they were “especially vulnerable to exploitation.”
Meanwhile, the leader of Kent County Council Paul Carter has criticised the government for failing to reimburse over successive years the full costs of looking after asylum children.
He said the issue was “a running sore” that successive governments had not addressed: “The substantial, recurring and unmet costs on our budget over many, many years averages £2m to £3m.
“We have an impeccable track record on looking after many thousands of vulnerable asylum children. Endless promises have been made by successive immigration ministers and the Home Office and they have not kept those promises.”
As a result, council taxpayers had subsidised those costs to the tune of “tens of millions of pounds.”
The South Kent CCG was asked to comment.
