CULTURE Secretary Lucy Frazer has defended comments on immigration made by the Home Secretary, insisting the UK believes that the integration of migrants is “really important”.
Ms Frazer was commenting on a speech made by Home Secretary Suella Braverman in Washington DC yesterday, in which she said multiculturalism has failed.
She told GB News: “I read the Home Secretary’s speech and what she was talking about was the importance of integration, integration of people who come here into our communities and that’s really important.
“And I think, as a country, we’ve done that tremendously well very recently in relation to those people who’ve come over from Ukraine, we’ve done it really well in relation to those who have come from Afghanistan.
“We’ve seen a huge amount of support from that but I think what she was focusing on was when we do take people, who have been suffering from persecution, it’s really important that we integrate those people into our communities.”
In a discussion during Breakfast with Eamonn Holmes and Isabel Webster, she also said: “Rishi, the Prime Minister, did a speech in December, on uncontrolled immigration and the issues that it causes for people in their local communities and he mentioned the importance of making sure that we stop the boats and we take action to do that.
“And this is, as the Home Secretary was saying, is a global issue that needs a global solution. The UN has stated that by the end of 2022, there were 108 million people displaced.
“We as a Government are working very carefully to make sure that we stop the boats coming over here through international solutions. You’ll know about our agreement with France, our agreement with Albania, which has actually managed to get those boat crossings down by 23% as compared to last year.”
She defended Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s comments on anti-gay discrimination for asylum: “That threshold is about persecution, not people fearing persecution, not fears of discrimination.
“What she was talking about is whether you are persecuted and therefore at risk of suffering in terms of losing your life.”
