My Lords, in supporting Amendment 84B, I declare my interest as a member of the MoD’s former assurance committee on locally employed civilians, set up to monitor the intimidation policy for Afghan interpreters. My concern is that, without this amendment, the relocation possibilities available to former Afghan interpreters will be significantly and unfairly reduced. I acknowledge, of course, that before ARAP our ex gratia redundancy scheme, though not without its problems, nevertheless managed to relocate well in excess of 5,000 interpreters and their families, and I think that number is probably now significantly higher. But ARAP was meant to improve eligibility even further. It now appears that the Government are determined to row back again with new restrictions, even though, at the point of the Taliban’s takeover, there were interpreters who had already obtained security clearance under either the ex gratia scheme or ARAP.
We need—and these people deserve—clarity. This amendment would ensure that they were eligible under category 1 of ARAP. They also deserve transparency of decision-making, but last July the Home Office rejected 21 interpreters on national security grounds for relocation under ARAP, despite the fact that the MoD had already confirmed that they were eligible. Their rejection letters from the Home Office gave no information on why this change of heart was made. Why is there not better alignment between the MoD and the Home Office on this? Nine of them have already had their rejections overturned, following judicial review, and this amendment would ensure that the others could also come to safety in the UK, as well as their family members, as was always the original intention and scope of the pre-ARAP scheme.
1.30 am