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MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE
THE HOME AFFAIRS SUB-COMMITTEE ON RACE RELATIONS AND IMMIGRATION
Mr Jeremy Hanley
MONDAY 4 FEBRUARY 1985
Members present:
Mr John Wheeler, in the Chair
Mr John Hunt
125
:
Memorandum submitted by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
I ADMISSION OF FURTHER Vietnamese Refugees to BRITAIN
A. GENERAL
Summary
1. UK policy on Vietnamese refugees is influenced by both domestic and foreign policy considerations. There is continuing evidence that the Vietnamese refugee community in the UK, who number over 18,500, have found it difficult to assimilate notwithstanding our efforts to assist. Over 80 per cent of Vietnamese adults here are unemployed. This fact suggests that resettlement in this country is not the ideal solution for the Vietnamese themselves though the Government will continue to do their best for those here. However we have a continuing international commitment to resettle family reunion and ship rescue cases (see paras 7-10 below). We agree with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that resettlement in countries like the UK is the least acceptable long-term solution, and we are working with UNHCR and other resettlement countries to find other durable solutions, eg voluntary repatriation and/or local integration. But such solutions are likely to prove hard to achieve and will take time.
2. We have the serious problem of unsettled refugees (some 12,800) in Hong Kong (see parts IB and II below). The difficulties this gives rise to in Hong Kong provide a strong incentive for us to find ways of resettling them outside the colony. But the major resettlement countries (United States, France, Canada and Australia) have increasingly taken the line that they cannot be expected to take more from Hong Kong if we are not prepared to do so too. There is no guarantee of course that they would in fact follow our lead. But some gesture from the United Kingdom would almost certainly improve Hong Kong's position. The Hong Kong Authorities continue to press us in this regard (see part II).
Background
3. The most serious exodus of refugees from Vietnam began in 1978, three years after the communist victory in the south. That year, some 150,000 refugees left Indo-China for temporary asylum elsewhere. Over 85,000 of them fled by boat from Vietnam. Of these over 6,000 arrived in Hong Kong. In addition, 260,000 Vietnamese of Chinese origin were forced out of Vietnam into China during the same year. These movements reflected first intensified pressure by the Vietnamese Government on the private sector of the economy, particularly in southern Vietnam, and second a sudden deterioration in Vietnam's relations with China. (At Annex A are tables and charts of refugee movements prepared by UNHCR on information available to them. The UNHCR figures for the UK do not necessarily accord exactly with the Government's own figures quoted in the memoran- dum).
The cost of printing and publishing these Minutes of Evidence is estimated by Her Majesty's Stationery Office at £2,700.
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