Priti Patel Sidesteps Debate on Rwanda Refugee Programme
The provisions of the Nationality and Borders Bill promoted by Home Secretary Priti Patel were due to be debated further in the House of Lords this week. However, as far as she is concerned, her radical scheme to send would-be asylum seekers on a one-way ticket to have their applications processed 6,000 miles southwards in the African state of Rwanda is not dependent on the passage of the Bill. Her intervention last week was undertaken as a “ministerial direction” that purports to be a procedural device within the existing law.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, described Ms Patel’s new policy as “ungodly” in his Easter address from the pulpit. Human rights and discrimination lawyers say they are ready to challenge any attempted implementation in the courts. Treasury sources have suggested disquiet over the cost of the scheme, calculated at an initial £120m. Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, a cross-bench peer who is former director of public prosecutions, said: “This is just another abnegation of responsibility by the government. We dump British terrorists on failed states, expecting our allies to bring them to justice, and now we’re bribing African countries to deal with our refugees. For a country that claims to prioritise its own sovereignty, we display an embarrassing tendency on other states to clear up our problems.”
The test from the government’s point of view will be whether the scheme deters the ongoing attempts to traverse the English Channel in small boats. Last week, in benign temperatures and sea conditions, six boats carrying an aggregate of 181 people are reported to have made it across.
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