Ukrainian refugees: Welsh Tories say UK response not good enough

The Welsh Conservatives have called for the UK government to go "further and faster" to help Ukrainian refugees.

Senedd Tory leader Andrew RT Davies said he was "not proud" of the scenes of people fleeing the war struggling to get to the UK in Calais.

He said he wants to pressure Westminster colleagues to act.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson, on Wednesday, promised the numbers coming in will "rise to in the region of the hundreds of thousands".

One man from the Vale of Glamorgan, who said he was waiting in a hotel in Germany for a visa for his father and grandfather, said the system was "shocking" and disorganised.

Steve Lucas, from Magor, Monmouthshire, who is in Poland trying to secure a visa for his Ukrainian wife Anastasia, said the whole system had made him "ashamed to be British".

On Wednesday Tories joined Labour and Plaid Cymru in calling for "an expedited visa process to ensure simple, fast, safe and legal routes to sanctuary in the UK" in a vote.

The Senedd proceeded to back Plaid Cymru calls for nuclear disarmament, which had been opposed by the Conservatives.

Meanwhile Labour's First Minister Mark Drakeford called for the Home Office to be stripped of its role in approving visas applications from Ukraine.

Andrew RT Davies said: "The Welsh Conservatives want to see a greater flexibility in the system to make sure that we can welcome as many refugees as possible to this country.

"It's incumbent on us as citizens of the United Kingdom to do that.

"We want to pressure our colleagues in Westminster along with cross party consensus to achieve that."

He told the debate, which was called by the Conservatives, that he was "damn proud" of the UK government's support of military and humanitarian aid, but was "not proud" of "the scenes we've seen with the refugees and the situation in Calais".

"We can do more, we must do more," he added.

Sam Kurtz, Tory Senedd member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire, told BBC Radio Wales Breakfast: "We need the UK government to go further on this, do it faster, and I think they've been caught on the hop somewhat and that has been disappointing."

Yuri Noble, 37, of Rhoose, Vale of Glamorgan, is currently in Germany waiting for visas for his father Volodymyr Romanychev, 72, and grandfather Olexander Moyeseyenko, 87, to enter the UK.

He left last week to drive to the Ukraine-Poland border to meet his father and grandfather, who lived in Kyiv.

"I'd never anticipated this. We left under the impression it would be a fairly straightforward visa application," said Mr Noble, who is in Dusseldorf.

"We're in our third hotel room waiting for it to be processed. It really is beyond.

"I love where I've been brought up, my country. Wales is fantastic and the UK, but at this rate I don't feel great confidence at all.

"My wife is up all night trying to get an appointment because it is such a poor system. It's seriously under-staffed, very disorganised and you can't get an appointment.

"We're fortunate that we have transport and financial support but others, women and children, don't. It's shocking.

"It's just a waiting game as to what's going to happen."

It is unusual for the Welsh Conservatives to criticise their colleagues in the UK government in this way.

It demonstrates the strength of feeling on this issue and it reflects a wider concern within the party at the comparatively slow UK response to the refugee crisis.

Andrew RT Davies has voiced differences of opinion to his UK party leader before, notably over his support for Brexit when David Cameron was prime minister, and more recently over Covid passes.

More generally Mr Davies and his colleagues in the Senedd have been supportive of Boris Johnson's government, even during some of the more difficult moments around lockdown party allegations.

All of which makes today's intervention significant.

Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Jane Dodds urged the Welsh Conservatives to tell Tories at Westminster that "there should be no need for visas".

"These are genuine refugees," she said. "They're women and children.

"How can we say that we need to do checks on women and children?

"They are desperate, absolutely desperate to come here."

Earlier on Wednesday, UK Conservative Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said that 760 visas have so far been granted to Ukrainians seeking to join family in the UK, up from 300 reported on Tuesday.

Mr Shapps said the government now had "a lot more" visa application slots available - with 6,000 now available a day - and that the government had "massively expanded up the number of processing locations."

Later Prime Minister Boris Johnson told the Commons the numbers of visas provided "are nearly a thousand" and will "rise very sharply".

"We expect those numbers to rise to in the region of the hundreds of thousands," he said.

"We understand how much refugees have to give to this country and we understand how much this country has to gain from welcoming refugees, and we will be generous and we are being generous."

Mark Drakeford called for the task of providing visas to be taken away from the Home Office.

Speaking at the Welsh Affairs Select Committee, he said: "The Home Office with its long history of hostile regimes to people coming from elsewhere in the world... the responsibility should be taken away from a department that has demonstrated its incapacity to mobilise and meet that [Ukrainian] response."

The first minister called for security checks to be carried out on Ukrainian refugees once they have arrived in the UK rather than before.

In the Senedd, Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price called it "morally untenable" for the UK to continue imports of Russian oil until the end of the year.

"We need nothing less than a full energy embargo immediately now," he said.

"It will be painful, we understand that but it's technically and economically possible."

In a Senedd debate on Wednesday, Welsh Labour ministers and Plaid Cymru called for an "expedited visa process to ensure simple, fast, safe and legal routes to sanctuary" in a amendment to a Tory motion criticising the invasion.

The move was backed by 52 MSs, including the Tory group.

The Conservatives opposed a Plaid Cymru amendment calling for all nations to sign a treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons, but the amendment passed with 20 in favour, 15 abstaining and 17 against.

The resulting motion, which included calls for nuclear disarmament, was passed by the Senedd with 26 in favour, 13 abstaining and 13 against.