Emergency legislation addressing the Supreme Court’s negative ‘Rwanda Plan’ ruling was due to be released on Wednesday. Rishi Sunak is now holding this back until at least Thursday, not because of left-wing civil servants or lawyers but due to the Conservative Party’s own inability to work out its stance on the issue. At least, after more than a decade of inaction, another day can’t hurt.
Ministers and MPs are split on how ‘tough’ this new legislation should be. One group believes the government must stick to Britain’s national and international human rights commitments, in particular the European Convention on Human Rights. The Daily Telegraph says Sunak could lose up to ten ministers if he chose to disregard the convention on asylum cases. But the other group, which includes Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick, is urging the prime minister to set these commitments to one side if doing so can help stop illegal migration.
In the same week that we highlighted Sunak’s aim to please everyone on Britain’s net zero drive, which is pleasing no one, reports suggested that the prime minister will take a middle-of-the-road approach to Channel crossings, too.
The Daily Mail wrote that the Tory leader, who is “walking a tightrope between [the] warring wings of his party,” is “expected to try to fudge the issue.” Citing government sources, The Times added that Sunak is hoping to win the support of the “vast majority” of his MPs with a “middle way” that excludes the most “hardline” option but is still sufficiently “tough.”
In an apparent reversal of the Brexit message, Sunak is understood to have decided to follow the European Convention on Human Rights to the letter while not applying sections of Britain’s own Human Rights Act.
Home Secretary James Cleverly also signed a new treaty with Rwanda on Tuesday, which he said addresses the concerns previously raised by the Supreme Court. But he is still unable to say whether any flights will take place before the next general election, which will be next autumn at the latest.
As Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who really shouldn’t be able to beat the Tories on immigration, pointed out, Cleverly’s visit to Rwanda means the Tory government has succeeded in sending more of its own ministers to the African nation than illegal migrants (zero). It also remains true that, under the £140 million-plus ‘plan,’ Britain will take in refugees who arrive from Rwanda.
Cleverly’s earlier announcements on legal migration were no more uplifting. By tightening visa requirements and earning thresholds for foreign workers, the home secretary celebrated plans he said “will mean around 300,000 people who came to the UK last year would not have been able to do so.” All this after a series of Tory governments produced a system under which many more than 300,000 migrants now arrive in Britain each year, despite promising to bring numbers down to the “tens of thousands.”
Commenting on the government’s proposals, Alp Mehmet, chairman of Migration Watch UK, told The European Conservative:
The latest measures are an admission that Conservative immigration policy has collapsed. If the government’s aim is now to reduce immigration by only 300,000 a year and it isn’t clear how that is going to happen, this will simply normalise what, until recently, was record-breaking levels of net migration. The result will be a rapidly growing population, with all the costs involved.
Rwanda or Not: Tories Still Can’t Agree on Approach to Illegal Migration
British Prime Minster Rishi Sunak
Photo: I T S / Shutterstock.com
Emergency legislation addressing the Supreme Court’s negative ‘Rwanda Plan’ ruling was due to be released on Wednesday. Rishi Sunak is now holding this back until at least Thursday, not because of left-wing civil servants or lawyers but due to the Conservative Party’s own inability to work out its stance on the issue. At least, after more than a decade of inaction, another day can’t hurt.
Ministers and MPs are split on how ‘tough’ this new legislation should be. One group believes the government must stick to Britain’s national and international human rights commitments, in particular the European Convention on Human Rights. The Daily Telegraph says Sunak could lose up to ten ministers if he chose to disregard the convention on asylum cases. But the other group, which includes Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick, is urging the prime minister to set these commitments to one side if doing so can help stop illegal migration.
In the same week that we highlighted Sunak’s aim to please everyone on Britain’s net zero drive, which is pleasing no one, reports suggested that the prime minister will take a middle-of-the-road approach to Channel crossings, too.
The Daily Mail wrote that the Tory leader, who is “walking a tightrope between [the] warring wings of his party,” is “expected to try to fudge the issue.” Citing government sources, The Times added that Sunak is hoping to win the support of the “vast majority” of his MPs with a “middle way” that excludes the most “hardline” option but is still sufficiently “tough.”
In an apparent reversal of the Brexit message, Sunak is understood to have decided to follow the European Convention on Human Rights to the letter while not applying sections of Britain’s own Human Rights Act.
Home Secretary James Cleverly also signed a new treaty with Rwanda on Tuesday, which he said addresses the concerns previously raised by the Supreme Court. But he is still unable to say whether any flights will take place before the next general election, which will be next autumn at the latest.
As Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who really shouldn’t be able to beat the Tories on immigration, pointed out, Cleverly’s visit to Rwanda means the Tory government has succeeded in sending more of its own ministers to the African nation than illegal migrants (zero). It also remains true that, under the £140 million-plus ‘plan,’ Britain will take in refugees who arrive from Rwanda.
Cleverly’s earlier announcements on legal migration were no more uplifting. By tightening visa requirements and earning thresholds for foreign workers, the home secretary celebrated plans he said “will mean around 300,000 people who came to the UK last year would not have been able to do so.” All this after a series of Tory governments produced a system under which many more than 300,000 migrants now arrive in Britain each year, despite promising to bring numbers down to the “tens of thousands.”
Commenting on the government’s proposals, Alp Mehmet, chairman of Migration Watch UK, told The European Conservative:
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