Keith Vaz says Scotland has led the way in resettling refugees

credit - Parliament TV

Scotland has “led the way” in efforts to resettle refugees fleeing the war in Syria, according to Keith Vaz, the chairman of the Commons Home Affairs select committee.

However, Vaz, a Labour MP, said there was a danger of a "two tier system" among UK councils.

His comments followed the publication of a report that showed 38 per cent of Syrian refugees were resettled in Scotland.

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The UK government has pledged to take in 20,000 refugees by 2020.

There were 610 of the 1,622 refugees arriving in the UK between October 2015 and March 2016 were settled by Scottish councils, according to figures released in May.

All but seven of Scotland's 32 local authorities took in refugees under the Syrian Vulnerable Persons Resettlement scheme.

Vaz told Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland programme: "The commitment made by David Cameron last year that Britain would take 20,000 refugees from Syria was extremely welcome, but that depends on local authorities being able to and being willing to take a very limited number of Syrian refugee families.

"In this respect, local authorities in Scotland like Glasgow and Edinburgh have led the way for the rest of the United Kingdom.

"They've taken their fair share, but there are whole swathes of the rest of the United Kingdom where no Syrian refugees have been resettled and that is a cause for worry because we're never going to meet that target unless everyone takes their fair share."