Germany is considering processing migrants in Rwanda, where facilities paid for by Britain are currently sitting empty.
Joachim Stamp, Germany’s migration commissioner, proposed using Rwanda as pressure grows on the coalition government to deal with the influx of asylum seekers.
Britain’s previous Conservative government spent £290 million on the facilities in Rwanda as part of a plan to process and deport asylum seekers to the African nation. However, the new Labour government scrapped the scheme immediately upon coming to power in July. The money spent on the facilities cannot be recouped.
New prime minister Sir Keir Starmer suggested Britain would be better off targeting its resources at smashing the people smuggling gangs sending migrants across the English Channel. However, critics warn the task will be next to impossible as new gangs quickly take the place of old ones, and scrapping the Rwanda scheme makes Britain look like a soft touch on illegal immigration.
Under Stamp’s proposal, the United Nations would supervise the asylum procedures in Rwanda. “We currently have no third country that has come forward, with the exception of Rwanda,” he said on the Table.Briefings podcast, published on Thursday.
Stamp, a member of the liberal FDP party, said the policy would specifically target migrants crossing into Germany from Belarus via Poland.
“My suggestion would be that we concentrate on this group. It’s about 10,000 people a year,” he said.
The decision will likely cause significant embarrassment for Britain’s left-wing government. The Telegraph reports that Tony Smith, former Border Force director general, who helped develop the Rwanda plan, said: “It was only a matter of time before another country stepped in. We have already done all the groundwork on this.”
Meanwhile, former Conservative home secretary James Cleverly, who is also standing to be party leader, said:
Labour’s first move in government was to scrap the Rwanda plan. Now Germany wants to use the facilities we built. The only people who benefit from Labour’s reckless immigration policies are people-smugglers and the EU.
While the UK is abandoning the scheme, the idea of processing migrants in third countries is gaining traction in the rest of Europe.
Plans by Giorgia Meloni’s Italian government to open processing centres in Albania, along with other measures, already appear to be having a deterrent effect. The country has seen an unprecedented 62% drop in seaborne illegal migration so far this year, with 37,000 migrants landing as of August 12th compared to nearly 100,000 in the same period in 2023.
Suella Braverman, another former Conservative home secretary, said:
Germany’s decision to adopt the Conservatives’ Rwanda scheme is more evidence of support within the EU of the need for a meaningful deterrence.
That Starmer ditched the plan makes the UK look like a soft touch for illegal migrants, makes us now an outlier from other EU states grappling with the migration crisis, and is a waste of the vital work done to get the scheme up and running. A big mistake that Starmer will come to regret.
Robert Jenrick, a former immigration minister who is also standing for the Conservative Party leadership, added:
Labour’s decision to scrap, not strengthen, the Rwanda plan looks more foolish by the day. Across Europe, leaders can see that you need a deterrent to stop illegal migration. Sir Keir has squandered such a highly-prized partnership and is now completely powerless to stop the boats.
