Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Debate between Lord Stewart of Dirleton and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Report stage
Monday 4th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clarke of Nottingham (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend asserts that the Government are complying with the rule of law and respect the position of the courts and so on. Why does the Bill expressly rule out any court in future considering any evidence that Rwanda perhaps is not complying with the treaty that he has described, and why does the Bill expressly rule out the provision of various features of international law when it comes to consider future behaviour by the Government of Rwanda? The terms of the Bill seem to contradict the complete confidence with which my noble friend is putting forward this ideal situation that is likely to prevail for all time on the ground in east Africa.

[Lord Stewart of Dirleton (Con)]

My Lords, the point of the Bill is to move the matter into the diplomatic and political sphere. The Bill and the treaty make the point that the matters are better considered there than they are in the court. That is my answer to the point which my noble friend makes.

Regarding Amendment 2, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, I cannot accept that the provisions of this Bill undermine the rule of law. Amendment 2, implying that this legislation is not compliant with the rule of law, is simply not right. The Bill is predicated on Rwanda’s and the United Kingdom’s compliance with international law in the form of the treaty, which itself reflects the international legal obligations of the United Kingdom and Rwanda, as my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth pointed out following his recent visit.

As has been stated in the debates on this Bill, the Government take their international obligations, including under the European Convention on Human Rights, seriously. There is nothing in this Bill that requires any act or omission that conflicts with the United Kingdom’s international obligations. Along with other countries with similar constitutional arrangements to the United Kingdom, and again echoing points made by my noble friend Lord Murray, we have a dualist approach, where international law is treated as separate from domestic law and incorporated into domestic law by Parliament through legislation. This Bill invites Parliament to agree with its assessment that the Supreme Court’s concerns have been properly addressed and to enact the measures in the Bill accordingly. The Bill reflects the fact—going back to my noble friend Lord Howard of Lympne’s opening points—that Parliament is sovereign and can change domestic law as it sees fit, including, if it be Parliament’s judgment, requiring a state of affairs or facts to be recognised.

The principle of recognising that certain countries are safe for immigration purposes, as your Lordships heard from my noble friend Lord Lilley, is a long-standing one that is shared by many other countries as part of their respective systems. The European Union states are not the only countries that may be safe for these purposes. Therefore, to act as the Government are proposing in terms of the Bill would not an unusual thing for Parliament to do. There is other immigration legislation in which Parliament recognises that states are generally safe. It is not akin to Parliament stating something to be the case contrary to the actual position. The Bill reflects the strength of the Government of Rwanda’s protections and commitments, given in the treaty, to people transferred to Rwanda in accordance with it. The treaty, alongside the evidence of changes in Rwanda since the summer of 2022, enables Parliament properly to conclude that Rwanda is safe.

In addressing other points raised on this matter, and echoing what I said in response to my noble friend Lord Clarke, my noble friend Lord Tugendhat moved the sphere of literary references governing discussion of the Bill in your Lordships’ House from Alice in Wonderland to George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. The point is not that the Government are proposing that Parliament should legislate contrary to the Supreme Court’s findings, but that Parliament should pass a Bill reflecting those decisions and acting on them. We are acting on the court’s decision, not overturning it.

I respectfully echo my noble friend Lord Howard of Lympne’s point, which again echoed his important speech at an earlier stage, that the theme of this matter is accountability—the accountability of Parliament and the Government to face the consequences of their actions and decisions before the electorate.

The importance of Parliament’s judgment is the central feature of the Bill and many of its other provisions are designed to ensure that Parliament’s conclusion on the safety of Rwanda is accepted by the domestic court. The treaty sets out the international legal commitments that the United Kingdom and the Rwandan Governments have made, consistent with their shared standards associated with asylum and refugee protection. It also commits both Governments to deliver against key legal assurances, in response to the conclusions of the UK Supreme Court. We are clear that we assess Rwanda to be a safe country and we are confident in the Government of Rwanda’s commitment to operationalising the partnership successfully in order to offer safety and security to those in need.

In answer to a point made by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, while Sir Winston Churchill was instrumental in drawing up the body or making possible the creation of the European convention, he did not say anything to alter the constitutional principle of the supremacy of Parliament, to which I have made reference.

I return to matters raised in the submission of the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool. He posed two questions, the first on the receipt of an answer to points made by committees of your Lordships’ House. I have checked that and it is anticipated that answers to the Joint Committee on Human Rights and the Constitution Committee will be issued by Wednesday.

The noble Lord also raised costs. The point is not that doing nothing does not have costs. We will doubtless return, later at this stage of the Bill, to the enormous expense inflicted on British taxpayers—running to billions of pounds a year—by maintaining the status quo. It is that status quo that we seek to interrupt.