Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Nigel Evans Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 12th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)]

Public services are on the verge of collapse, the gap between rich and poor has widened, and we are slipping back into the Victorian era. Food bank use is at an all-time high, and workers have not had a decent pay rise in 15 years. But we are not here today to talk about those things—in fact, we are barely ever here to talk about them in any meaningful way. We are here to legislate on the dog-whistle, fantasist policies of the Conservative party, who are electioneering when they should be governing, not offering any real solutions to problems and attempting to divert attention from their own failings as a Government. They are wasting the time of this House and squandering the good will of the people of this country.

We keep going round and round on this matter. Our Supreme Court has ruled on it: it found Rwanda to be unsafe, a ruling that was based on evidence. Legislating the opposite is not going to rid us of the facts. This is not an exercise in parliamentary sovereignty, but an abuse of this Parliament’s functions. It undermines the rule of law and the constitutional separation of powers. Yes, we are lawmakers and we can make and change the law, but the law cannot be used to change the facts.

Another fact is that the treaty with Rwanda, coupled with the Bill, breaches many of our obligations under international law. If that were in doubt in any way, the Government have helpfully outlined that fact throughout the entire Bill. Clause 3, for example, disapplies key sections of the Human Rights Act. It directly prevents the courts from applying the Bill in a way that is compatible with convention rights, it prevents any consideration of previous rulings of the European Court of Human Rights that have found Rwanda to be unsafe, and it removes human rights obligations from public bodies, including courts. The Bill would place an obligation on every single decision maker who has found Rwanda unsafe to simply rule it as safe. It restricts the courts’ ability to protect people who are at risk of harm, and it restricts individual legal protections. Do the Government fully understand what that means? Do they see how far they have sunk? Are they so fanatical about this flawed policy that they would bar courts from considering the very reasons why Rwanda might be unsafe, stripping people of individual legal protections?

From the very outset, this Bill has been ridiculous. Conservative Members would do well to note that there is no more empire. International law is not whatever we say it is; it is comprised of agreements and treaties adopted by Members of this House, and to dismiss them as the rules of foreign courts is as irresponsible as it is untrue. We signed up to those solemn and binding rules, so the Bill risks our international reputation and makes us hypocrites. How dare we condemn other countries that do not uphold international law, and how dare we preach to them, when we would undermine the rule of law ourselves? This Government do not really care about that, though. They care more about the squabbles of the Conservative party than our standing as a country.

If this Government were serious about resolving the issues surrounding small boats, they would do more to target people traffickers, and they would provide safe and legal routes. People do not take those perilous journeys for fun: they are often fleeing some of the worst persecution. They are some of the most vulnerable people in the world, not the Conservative party’s scapegoats. As has already been said, those who seek asylum from countries such as Ukraine and Hong Kong do not have to come by unconventional means because the Government have given them the ability to come by other means. The Government need to stop misleading the public with their use of the word “illegal”, because seeking asylum in this country is not illegal; it is not against any of our laws, domestic or international.

It is the Government who have exacerbated the problems in the asylum system, not the vulnerable people who are seeking asylum. We know this because the vast majority of claims are justified. After lengthy delays, three quarters of applications are accepted. The longer these processes drag on, the longer refugees and asylum seekers are prevented from rebuilding their lives in this country, and from working and contributing to our economy.

This Government have already spent hundreds of millions of pounds on a policy that is as crap as it is unworkable. [Interruption.] There is nothing more telling than the fact that the Secretary of State has been unable to make a section 19 statement. He could not say that this Bill was compatible with the European convention on human rights. The Home Secretary means to take us all for fools. For the second time this year, he cannot say that his plans for removing asylum seekers to Rwanda will not break international law. The Rwandan Government have been very clear. They have said that they will not continue with this deal if it does not meet the highest standards of international law. This Bill does not do that. This Government are wasting our time. This is not going to work, and I am not even sure it was meant to.

I am sick and tired of being dragged to this House to approve legislation that does nothing to improve the lives of my constituents or uphold the values of our society. This Bill should simply not be allowed to go any further.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I am sure that when Members rush to read Hansard tomorrow, they will read the word “crass”.

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

indicated assent.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Thank you, and I am sure that Hansard will have taken note of that.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Daly]

I agree with my hon. Friend. We have heard some blanket statements about immigration, but one of the curious things I found when speaking to people on the beaches was that the people seeking immigration to this country were all males, all single and all of a certain age. There were virtually no females in any of the places we were taken.

We are escaping both from what our constituents want and from the reality that motivates people. When I was in those camps, people told me, “We are told that the United Kingdom’s streets are paved with gold. When we go there, we are going to be provided with a lot of financial support through benefits and other things.” That is what is motivating the vast majority of these people to come to this country. Listening to Opposition Members, we would think that nobody in the world has that motivation to come here; that everyone is fleeing some type of persecution. That is utter nonsense.

Our constituents expect us, as a Government and as a Parliament, to put in place a suite of measures to address the problem happening in the channel. This Bill, as many of my hon. and right hon. Friends have said, is one of a number of measures being taken by this Government, on which they should be congratulated.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness said, although nobody seemed to pick up the point, the French authorities told us that a deterrent effect and policy—the Rwanda policy—is absolutely necessary. We saw, as did the French authorities, that when the policy was first announced, even though people were potentially coming over the channel, there was a drop in cases. The spike came only when it became clear that, through various legal means, the policy would not be taken forward.

Not only do the French authorities think we need a deterrent, and not only are countries such as Germany, the United States, Italy and Austria all saying that they need some type of policy and they need to follow the UK’s lead, but it is what our constituents want. We cannot have a situation where we cannot house people, where people cannot get a doctor’s appointment and where people cannot afford a house. That may be acceptable to Opposition Members, but we cannot have a situation where we have 10,000 foreign national offenders in our prison system. We have to take measures that reflect the will of the people, not the will of middle-class, liberal consciences. I sometimes feel it is more important for some to moralise than actually be concerned about what motivates their constituents and what we should be doing in this place.

I have heard two objections to the Bill, one of which relates to rule 39 injunctions. I wish to ask the Minister about that, because I agree completely with what my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Sir Geoffrey Cox) said. May I ask the Minister to comment on the Government’s legal advice? I say that because, technically, the Government can ignore rule 39 injunctions; that is what the Bill states, although he may be able to tell me something different. I think that is an important part of the Bill and I would be grateful if he would comment on it.

I respect every contribution made by a Conservative Member, but I cannot believe that anyone thinks—I have certainly not read any legal advice that thinks this—that we should exclude the right of appeal or, in extreme circumstances, the right to challenge whether someone should be taken to a foreign country. There must be such circumstances. Even the star chamber advice says that there must be at least form of allowance in respect of that. The legal test that the Government have put in place, whereby somebody must show “compelling evidence” that they would suffer “serious and irreversible harm”, is a strong one. It will address, both legally and practically, everything that our constituents want us to do.

This is a good policy—one that the Government have worked hard to refine. It is within the bounds of international law and of what this Government have undertaken to the country, which is to tackle illegal migration and stop the boats crossing the channel.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I must now impose a five-minute limit.