Facts

On 7th March the Home Office Tweeted: “The UK Government’s Ukraine Family Scheme is the first visa scheme in the world to launch since President Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

“It gives Ukrainian people the freedom and means to support themselves while they are here in the United Kingdom.”

An investigation by Full Fact accepted that it could find “no earlier schemes since the invasion, and Refugee Action told us it wasn’t aware of new schemes run by other countries.”

But it added, “the claim lacks important context: many European countries taking refugees did not require Ukrainians to have visas in the first place.”

Verdict

The Home Office failed to publish relevant information and therefore misled the public. This false statement shows the extent to which the dishonesty of the Johnson administration has implicated Whitehall. Civil servants have a duty to be truthful and impartial. Here the civil service was issuing a statement which boosted the deceitful political narrative promoted by the Johnson government was leading the world in coming to the rescue of Ukrainian refugees.

We approached the Home Office to give them a chance to comment, but received no response.