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Farron: David Cameron “heartless and stupid” to ignore plight of child refugees in Europe

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 28th January 2016 - 9:12 am

Tim Farron has been doing the rounds on the media this morning to talk about the Government’s announcement that it will allow some child refugees into the UK. However, there are no plans to take unaccompanied children who are already in Europe. Tim has been arguing since the Summer for the Government to do more to help these children and was the first party leader to back Save the Children’s campaign for 3000 refugee children to be given sanctuary in this country so that they didn’t have to spend their lives in refugee camps, or vulnerable to exploitation. He has questioned the Prime Minister on this at every opportunity and before Christmas presented a Bill to enshrine that commitment into law. Laura Kuenssberg’s assertion in the BBC report that the announcement comes after pressure in “recent days” does not recognise Tim’s long-standing efforts.

Tim’s initial reaction to the announcement was that it didn’t go far enough as it didn’t do enough for those children who had already made it to Europe.

This is an important step, but it is far from the guarantee these desperate children need, and action must follow immediately.

Thousands of children are travelling across Europe. They are cold, alone and scared. They deserve a safe, welcoming home and I won’t stop until that’s what we’ve given them.

As a country we must pull together and offer them a home, while encouraging our European neighbours to do the same.