Ukraine — House of Commons, 2022-03-15
Topic: International Affairs
Daniel Robert Kawczynski (Conservative, Centre-right): Poland is playing such a critical role at this juncture in helping her neighbour to the east, I just want to say a few words as the only Polish-born British Member of Parliament in the Chamber and as chairman of the all- party parliamentary group on Poland. Some 84 Members have joined our group, making it one of the largest. If any colleague wishes to join, we would welcome them with open arms I remember 40 years ago being at school in Buckinghamshire when martial law was declared in Poland. The Russians, 40 years ago, were threatening an invasion of Poland to suppress and destroy the Solidarity movement and Lech Wałęsa, who were fighting for their freedom to escape the clutches of Soviet oppression and get out from behind the iron curtain. One of the most emotional things I experienced as a child was coming to school one day in 1982 and seeing huge numbers of lorries parked outside. Every child had brought food parcels to the school to send to Poland, because they saw on their television screens how the economy had disintegrated, and how martial law and the brutal communist dictator Jaruzelski had created food queues. Nothing was actually functioning. Now, 40 years on, I am very proud that the Polish diaspora here in the United Kingdom has played a tremendous role in gathering food, medicines and clothing to be sent to Poland to help Ukrainian refugees. The Polish community in this country is now almost 1 million strong. I pay tribute to my close friend Anna Buckley, who runs a Polish school in Wrexham, and to my friend Bogusław Malinowski, who is a member of the Shrewsbury Conservatives; they and many other Poles have been in touch with me and have been organising deliveries of food, clothing and medicine to Ukrainians. Poland has taken in more than 1.5 million Ukrainian refugees, and the figure is rising all the time. Polish people understand how interdependent they are with their eastern neighbour and how important it is to help at this time I have got to know the Ukrainian ambassador, my friend Vadym Prystaiko, over the past few years in my campaign against the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which many of us see as a tremendous threat to Ukraine and to our NATO partners in central and eastern Europe. I bowed my head to him and apologised that so many of us did not fully come to terms with or recognise the step-by-step salami-slicing tactics of the Russian Government. We should have realised that South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea were major warning signs that this lunatic was starting to get out of control and would cause a major conflagration on our continent. When I was on the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, we visited Donetsk and Luhansk, but even then, when we saw the tremendous destruction, I was not fully cognisant of the potential dangers ahead, so I have apologised to the Ukrainian ambassador Putin is trying to ethnically cleanse Ukraine. He wants to target civilians and destroy residential areas because he wants to ethnically cleanse that beautiful country and Russify it. That is why it is essential for Britain to take a lead in creating a Marshall plan to help countries such as Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Moldova, which between them have taken more than 95% of all Ukrainian refugees. Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania have the comfort of being NATO partners, so we know we stand by them under article 5—if the Russians cross that fence, both sides know what the ramifications will be for both sides—but Moldova does not have that protection. Just yesterday, the Prime Minister of Moldova, Natalia Gavrilita, said that her country is really struggling to cope with the 200,000 refugees who have poured across the border I recognise the need for us in the United Kingdom to support Ukrainian refugees coming to our shores, particularly those who have family already here; I have reached out to my Ukrainians in Shrewsbury. I appeal to the Opposition: if you want to hold the Government to account, as we do, please focus on how they are going to take a lead on our continent to create a Marshall plan in conjunction with the European Union and America to help our NATO partners such as Poland. We do not know how long this war will go on. We want to stand by them financially to give them the support they need to sustain looking after the Ukrainians, so that the Ukrainians are never ethnically driven away from their region by this brutal dictator.