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Summer Recess Adjournment

I am pleased to have an opportunity to raise what is an important and urgent issue in my constituency. The House has often debated, and dealt with questions about, Zimbabwe and the difficulties experienced in that country. Some 12 years ago my local church, Saltash Wesley Methodist church, established a twinning arrangement with a church in Mbare, a suburb of Harare. During the first few years of that arrangement, we enjoyed four annual reciprocal visits. One involved young people from Cornwall going to Zimbabwe to help build water tanks. That was a long time ago, and over the intervening nine years there have been no opportunities for the visits to continue. However, despite the great difficulty that arose, connections have continued through e-mail and letters between families, and support has been given to the people who are living in such desperate circumstances. In more recent times a number of members of the church have supplied funds for the education of Zimbabwean children, and nearly 100 have benefited. A great deal of moral support has also been provided. Earlier this year, when there were signs that Zimbabwe might have a real opportunity to emerge from its darker times, the churches decided to try to re-establish the original relationship—or friendship—through reciprocal visits. It was decided that it might be possible to bring a number of leaders from the church in Mbare to Cornwall this year. That involved great difficulties relating not only to the funds that would have to be arranged, but to choosing the people and ensuring that the visit would be successful. It involved planning for the future, and re-establishing relationships that had been somewhat curtailed over the intervening period. However, as a result of all the planning over six or seven months, the money was raised, it wad decided who would come, and everyone was looking forward to a visit between 24 September and 7 October this year. The air tickets had to be purchased before the application for visas, but they were subsequently bought. The visas for the eight people who were to come here were applied for in Pretoria, which is now in charge of visa applications for Zimbabwe. It was a cause of huge disappointment and great regret that only a couple of weeks ago, with only a few weeks left before the visit, all the entry clearance visa applications were refused. We are talking about people who have provided leadership in Zimbabwe: ministers of the church, youth leaders and people who had worked on environmental projects. We are talking about people who had given dedicated service over a long period. They had met all the necessary requirements, and they were, of course, hoping to come to this country to re-establish a relationship that went back more than 12 years. It seems to me that the entry clearance officer examined all the available information and decided that perhaps these people of honesty and integrity, who had clearly served their communities in an excellent way, were not the sort of people who would come to this country and then willingly leave. He, or she, believed that those people intended to come here, stay here and not return to their home country. That was despite the fact that they would be leaving families and friends, and despite clear evidence from people in this country, including me and, indeed the superintendent minister of the church. We had given details of the programme in which they would be involved and the issues that they would discuss with us. We had also given an absolute assurance that they would not reside here or impose a burden, but would come to re-establish friendships and then return to the country with which we have maintained a twinning arrangement. I plead with the Deputy Leader of the House to consult the Minister for Borders and Immigration. They must recognise that these issues will continue. If we are to support people in Zimbabwe, we must recognise the opportunities to re-establish relationships and friendships between organisations, churches, families and people. This is a great opportunity to bring eight very good people back into this country so that a relationship between two churches that has lasted for more than 12 years can be re-established, and so that—hopefully—a group of people from my church in Saltash will be able to visit them in Zimbabwe next year. The twinning arrangement has been mutually beneficial. It is not a one-way exercise: great benefit has been gained from an arrangement that has been undergone through such difficult circumstances. However, after those people had done all that they could, after all their funding had been arranged, their tickets purchased and their accommodation fixed, they were told "You cannot come here, because we think that you are coming purely in order to stay here." That is an insult to them, and it is a disaster in terms of this country's relationship with Zimbabwe. I very much hope that the Government will intervene. I hope that they will recognise that visits and relationships of this kind are worthy of support, and that those people will be able to come to Cornwall, enjoy their stay, and return to their country reinvigorated.