Peter Burke
Chair
Oxford For Europe
18 April 2024
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The Safety of Rwanda Bill speaks volumes about how this government thinks – or doesn’t
There is something reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland about the government’s grand Rwanda plan. We know that, and they know it, and yet is being pushed forward and defended by government stooges as if there were something even vaguely sensible or ethical about it. They even pretend that this is being done in a “humanitarian cause”.
A residue of the Johnson era
The plan started its life almost exactly 2 years ago, during the Johnson premiership, and Sunak came to office almost certainly knowing it was nonsense. His scepticism is likely to be shared by all 3 of the other most senior members of government, Cameron, Hunt and Cleverly. The PM could have killed off the plan on coming to office – following his promise of ‘integrity, professionalism and accountability’ – but clearly did not have the political security or confidence to stand up to the extremists in his own party. Instead he has allowed himself to turn it into his party’s flagship policy, under the slogan “stop the boats”. Now his political survival is linked to its success. This at a time when the government’s focus should be above all on the many real crises it is confronting, including Ukraine, the Middle East, virtual famine in our own country, and the possibility that a hostile regime in Washington is just around the corner. At a time, above all, when we should be drawing closer to our near allies and not indulging in blind isolationism.
There’s always been a degree of cognitive dissonance in the plan to deport ‘illegal migrants’ to Rwanda against their will. Its stated objective is to act as a deterrent. Of course, under international law they are not illegal migrants but bona fide asylum seekers until their case has been considered. The government set out to change that in its Illegal Migration Act 2023, which perhaps should more properly be called the Illegal Illegal Migration Act. So the theory is that people who have risked their lives often in unseaworthy craft, and have heard of many others drowned on the journey, will be deterred by the very small chance of being deported to Rwanda. The government is at pains simultaneously to show that deportation to Rwanda is unpleasant enough to act as a deterrent, and also that Rwanda is a safe, green and pleasant land. Remember Suella Braverman taking us proudly on a tour of the housing in the Bwiza Riverside estate in Kigali, allegedly designed for these deportees? She wanted to tell us how well they would be looked after. The reality is that those houses have mostly already been sold to local people and many are speculating that that was the plan from day 1. Did she know at the time that she was misleading us – in that as in so many other respects?
Meaningless and uneconomic
All of this talk of deterrence is of course meaningless unless the people involved have heard of the Rwanda plan and care about it. Have they and do they? And the scheme relies on the simple practical issue of finding a carrier willing to co-operate in deporting migrants, something which since the first abortive attempts has proven near-impossible. Furthermore the treaty provides for the Rwandan regime to send back to the UK some of its own people who are surplus to requirements. I wonder who will be chosen?
Leaving that aside, no sane person would think the scheme makes economic sense. There are various estimates for how much the government has already committed to it, but it may be over £500 million for the first 300 people, with not one migrant yet having been transported. So perhaps near £2 million per capita.
Add to that the fact that Paul Kagame, Rwandan President, has threatened to pull the plug on the whole scheme if it is found to be in breach of international law. Ironic perhaps, given his own record, that he should pose as the defender of international law, but in principle he has left himself the option to take his money and run.
Unsafe or very unsafe?
The Supreme Court found in November that Rwanda is in fact unsafe, and that deportees faced a risk of ill-treatment and of being sent back to their home countries (Refoulement). As they put it:
“We conclude that the Court of Appeal was correct to reverse the decision of the Divisional Court, and was entitled to find that there are substantial grounds for believing that the removal of the claimants to Rwanda would expose them to a real risk of ill-treatment by reason of refoulement. It was accordingly correct to hold that the Secretary of State’s policy is unlawful. The Secretary of State’s appeal is therefore dismissed.”
This was based on good evidence, and gave the government a further challenge. The attempt to solve that problem with the hastily-drafted Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill was always unscrupulous and misguided. Here is a government trying to turn an unsafe country into a safe one through legislation. The government, in this bill, is furthermore telling us that the courts can no longer decide that Rwanda is unsafe, and this would be true in perpetuity regardless of what happens there in the interim and who is in charge.
Here are some telling extracts:
“I am unable to make a statement that, in my view, the provisions of the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill are compatible with the Convention rights, but the Government nevertheless wishes the House to proceed with the Bill.” – James Cleverly, on the cover page referring to the ECHR (Ironic and revealing, is it not, that he was the person who allegedly described the whole plan as “batshit”?)
“A court or tribunal must not consider a review of, or an appeal against, a decision of the Secretary of State or an immigration officer relating to the removal of a person to the Republic of Rwanda to the extent that the review or appeal is brought on the grounds that the Republic of Rwanda is not a safe country.”
“The Parliament of the United Kingdom is sovereign, and… the validity of an Act is unaffected by international law”.
“Every decision-maker must conclusively treat the Republic of Rwanda as a safe country”.
“Interim measures of the European Court of Human Rights…. It is for a Minister of the Crown (and only a Minister of the Crown) to decide whether the United Kingdom will comply with the interim measure…. Accordingly, a court or tribunal must not have regard to the interim measure when considering any application or appeal which relates to a decision to remove the person to the Republic of Rwanda under a provision of, or made under, the Immigration Acts”.
In other words, the judgement of UK courts is subordinate to that of ministers, and UK courts are required to ignore interim rulings of the ECHR.
Furthermore the Bill disapplies portions of the Human Rights Act 1998.
This is not the first time this has happened. Just one other example is the Judicial Review and Courts Act 2022, which set out in effect, to limit the Courts’ right to act as a check and balance on government actions.
The Lords a-leaping with anger
It can come as no surprise that the Lords had serious problems with this plan. The bill is now nearing the end (?) of a long ping-pong process, going back-and-forth between Commons and Lords. Each time it leaves the Lords it carries amendments which of course finish up being rejected on return to the Commons. Ministers would have you believe that there are wrecking amendments still on the table. This is not the case. What the Lords are asking at the moment is modest. Firstly – and this should be blindingly obvious – that people who worked for the British Army in Afghanistan should be exempt from deportation (Amendment 10D). Secondly, that the decision on whether Rwanda is still a safe country should be taken by the independent Monitoring Committee already established, and should be subject to review. Again blindingly obvious. The government is refusing to accept such frankly sensible amendments on the grounds that they allegedly present loopholes for ‘activist lawyers’ to exploit.
The government is making itself look even more ridiculous. It is wasting vast amounts of goodwill and parliamentary time forcing through a bill designed to punish, among others, those who have risked their lives in the service of the UK armed forces.
Does it all matter?
Why should all this matter to us here in Oxford for Europe? There are many reasons.
Firstly, the whole scheme is inhumane. What is more it is precisely its inhumanity which makes it attractive to the Tory right wing. It is seen as a vote winner, even if it achieves nothing else. Imagine making a virtue out of ill treating some of the most vulnerable people in the country. People, it should be added, many of whom could make a very useful contribution to society in years to come. And remember, the scheme is stigmatising those with a valid case as much as those without. The expectation is that applications for asylum will be heard in Rwanda, but there is no prospect of returning to the UK even if the application is successful.
Secondly, the perceived need for the whole scheme is a direct consequence of Brexit. Without Brexit, the UK would still be part of the EU’s Dublin III regulation, according to which the UK would have had the opportunity to return many of the irregular migrants to France. Critics of this argument will tell you that the numbers sent back to France were only ever in the hundreds, as if they really believed that the capacity of the Rwanda scheme will be any larger than that. Brexit may or may not have taken away some of the barriers to the Rwanda scheme, but is this really what ‘Brexit freedoms’ look like?
Thirdly, the whole business is redolent of evidence-free and magical thinking. To pretend that a country is safe simply because you say it is, is like telling the people that a cat is a dog and expecting them to believe you. This thinking comes from the same stable as the pretence that Brexit would cut red tape, increase sovereignty or make life easier, that freeports would be the key to prosperity, that the country would benefit from membership of CPTPP, or indeed, as we have just been told, that depriving GPs of the right to issue sick notes would somehow make the population healthier. This is the kind of thinking that frankly we can do without
Fourthly, the whole point of the new bill is to undermine both national and international law. It explicitly states that British courts must be subordinate to ministers on the question of Rwanda’s safety, irrespective of evidence to the contrary, and that this will apply in perpetuity. It is telling us therefore that the Supreme Court was simply wrong in its judgement. What effect will this have on respect for law and order at home? The bill is further declaring that international law and some provisions of the Human Rights Act no longer apply. It specifically mentions the European Court of Human Rights, only to say we should ignore it.
We need the ECHR
The UK remains signed up to the European Convention on Human Rights, in common with every other European country apart from Belarus and Russia (does that not say something in itself?). Membership of the convention goes hand-in-hand with participation in the European Court of Human Rights and the Council of Europe. There are people on the Braverman wing of the Tory Party who see departure from all of these as essential – this has been described as Brexit 2.0. But such a move would be catastrophic. It would confirm the U.K.’s position as an international pariah. It would tear away an important safeguard for citizens in disputes with their own government. And do not forget that the European Court of Human Rights is not, as many Tories, including Sunak, choose to call it, a “foreign court”, rather it is an international court on which the UK is represented, and indeed of which it was a founder member. Like the European Movement, it owes a great deal to Churchill.
The ping-pong process is nearing an end. The next confrontation is due on Monday 22nd April, and it seems likely that the government will have the last word. It will then no doubt try to get some planes of the ground before the election, and may push forward on its plan to set up similar arrangements with other countries (success will prove elusive). But in doing so all it will be doing is demonstrating its desperation, its ignorance, its lawlessness, its magical thinking and its performative cruelty.
The views expressed here are the author’s own and not necessarily representative of Oxford for Europe
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