A "Good Samaritan Bill" aiming to help reunite refugee families in the UK has cleared its first Commons test as Tory MPs demanded action.

MPs cheered and there was applause in the Commons chamber after the Refugees [Family Reunion] Bill was given an unopposed Second Reading; from the public gallery actress and campaigner Juliet Stevenson gave a two thumbs-up sign.

The decision followed a successful move by the SNP to secure enough support to avoid the bill being talked out - and therefore blocked - in the face of UK Government opposition.

Angus Brendan MacNeil, the Nationalist MP for Na h-Eileanan an Iar, who is behind the Private Member’s Bill, hopes that it would allow child refugees to sponsor their close family members to join them in the UK.

The backbencher told MPs how his proposal reflected current Home Office guidelines, that similar legislation existed across Europe and the measures would help as many as 1,000 people.

He also accused the Government of "Orwellian doublespeak of the worst kind" after it outlined its opposition to his proposal by claiming it could put people in danger.

Blue-on-blue disagreements emerged during the debate with Anna Soubry, the former Business Minister, encouraging party colleagues to allow the bill to progress as, among other reasons, it would send out a "very strong signal" about the "sort of type of Conservatives we're all proud to call ourselves".

The Nottinghamshire MP told the Commons: "It's very easy to take a group of people and attach to them a label which actually really then disassociates yourself from seeing each and every person in that group as what they are - a human being with a story to tell."

But her Tory colleague, Huw Merriman, who represents Bexhill and Battle in Sussex, raised concerns over potential "pull factors" created by the bill while Michelle Donelan, the Conservative MP for Chippenham, said: "I completely agree that family reunification is in the interests of health, wellbeing and humanity.

"However, is it not the impetus it could give to criminal gangs and human traffickers that is the concern here today, a genuine concern?"

In response, Ms Soubry said: "We are talking about people who are already here, whose status has been determined as genuine refugees.

"The idea that there are gangs of people smugglers in Syria going through this desperate warzone with all the destruction, looking for families to somehow entice them to put their children into their hands is just stuff of fantasy.”

The Tory backbencher said such debates should be conducted on the basis of facts and evidence - and at times emotion - and added: "These aren't people who come here to take, these are people who come here to give."

Opening the debate, Mr MacNeil - who had previously referred to his proposal as a "Good Samaritan Bill" - told MPs: "You'd have to have a very hard heart or really an empathy bypass not to ensure these very limited measures I ask for today do not become law."

Before the debate, Caroline Nokes, the Home Office Minister, urged MPs not to support the SNP MP’s bill and defended the Government's response to the humanitarian crisis created by the Syrian civil war.

She said the UK was halfway towards its commitment to resettle 20,000 people through the vulnerable person's resettlement scheme and there was a commitment to resettle up to 3,000 vulnerable children through another scheme.

"Those who - with all good intention - try to promote and encourage alternative pathways to the UK could be putting the very people they are trying to help in danger," she argued.

But Labour's Yvette Cooper, who chairs the Commons Home Affairs Committee, said concerns over children being able to reunite with their family had resulted in unused places under an existing resettlement scheme.

"This issue is being cited in some areas as being the reason why Italy and Greece are not placing children and child refugees as part of the Dubs amendment; because they are concerned that in any other country in Europe they will be able to be reunited with family but in the UK they will not.

"However, there are 240 places offered by local authorities that are empty as a result and we're not filling those Dubs places because there is such a gap between the UK's position and the rest of Europe's on this," she said.

Afzal Khan, the Shadow Home Office Minister, offered Labour's support for Mr MacNeil’s bill.

A closure motion to end debate early and move to a decision on second reading was approved by 129 to 42, a majority of 87. Ms Soubry, fellow former Tory ministers Bob Neill and Sir Peter Bottomley as well as Crawley MP Henry Smith, were the four Conservatives to support the closure motion.

The legislation will undergo further scrutiny at a later stage and is only likely to become law if, in the light of the Government’s opposition, there is a significant Conservative rebellion.