UK passes bill to send asylum seekers to Rwanda

Lawyers prepare for legal battles on behalf of individual asylum seekers challenging removal to east Africa

Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda deportation bill will become law after peers eventually backed down on amending it, opening the way for legal battles over the potential removal of dozens of people seeking asylum.

After a marathon battle of “ping pong” over the key legislation between the Commons and the Lords, the bill finally passed when opposition and crossbench peers gave way on Monday night.

The bill is expected to be granted royal assent on Tuesday. Home Office sources said they have already identified a group of asylum seekers with weak legal claims to remain in the UK who will be part of the first tranche to be sent to east Africa in July.

Sunak has put the bill, which would deport asylum seekers who arrive in the UK by irregular means to Kigali, at the centre of his attempts to stop small boats crossing the Channel.

Ekybio,
@Ekybio@lemmy.world avatar

For a time now I heard that the UK is a dying empire, desperatly clinging on to a version long gone and being stuck in the past.

In wake of recent anti-trans legislation, Brexit, migration-panics and general declining lifestile, I tend to agree with the statement. The UK is falling behind rapidly, but instead of combating that with progressive policy, the embrace of conservtaive ideas like this will just accelerate the decay.

I just hope Scotland and northern Ireland can get out before its too late.

Gingerbeardman,

14 years of Conservative rule will do that to a country 🤷‍♂️

circuscritic,

Labour has been self-sabotaging and removing anyone from leadership that isn’t cut from the same neo-liberal cloth that runs the Democratic party.

That doesn’t make the Tories any less of the inbred pederast hucksters that they are, but it has played a significant role in helping the Tories stay in power.

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

You would think they would have learned from Thatcher.

apfelwoiSchoppen,
@apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world avatar

We as a species have a hard time learning from the past, unfortunately. See gestures at world

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

True. Trump is on the road to being re-elected.

InformalTrifle,

Funny how Scotland and Northern Ireland can get out but Wales and England are stuck. How do I vote for England independence from the failing U.K.

captainlezbian,

What’s Rwanda’s take on this? Like I assume they get a say

Also, aren’t your crops rotting in the fields. As a citizen of your child nation, can you not figure out how to use these two problems to create a single solution? Look at all of us. We all do this.

echodot,

After a marathon battle of “ping pong” over the key legislation between the Commons and the Lords, the bill finally passed when opposition and crossbench peers gave way on Monday night.

No it didn’t. It passed because conservative Lords eventually got bored and let it pass. They were the ones that were blocking it originally, it was never just the opposition. Labour doesn’t have a majority in the house.

crapwittyname,

Just to fill in the background here, this wacko policy was introduced by Boris Johnson at some point in order to score some political points in one 24hr news cycle or another. Since then it’s been championed by two of the most far-right Home Secretaries in the history of the office, with Braverman making it a wedge issue for the Tory party. Earlier this year, Sunak needed the support of the far right of his party, and he promised this bill to get that support. So, even though the law is “batshit” according to the current Home Secretary (yes that’s real) we are going ahead with it purely because it’s the only way to keep this government together for as long as possible. That is a maximum of eight months until the last possible moment they are forced to call an election.
To summarise: the UK government is breaking international law and subverting its own Supreme Court, along with any number of democratic processes, in order to push through a cruel, ludicrous and counterproductively expensive law just in order to hold on to power for weight months.
To summarise the summary: FUCK the Tories.

echodot,

And it probably won’t hold them together anyway. The far right have shown in the past that they are completely incapable of being satiated. Short of bringing back hangings for people whose faces don’t fit they won’t be happy.

A competent prime minister would have told them to go spin on it. Since what they going to do, break up the party, the conservatives are doomed anyway.

ajoebyanyothername,

I’ve seen it suggested that he might call an election sooner than later, to avoid the possibility of this failing (more so than it already has), but there have also been several other times when it’s seemed like there might be an election and nothing happened. Seems like Sunak is just waiting/hoping for something he can tout as a win and try to go into an election on the back of it, presumably in an attempt to minimise the losses. The budget certainly didn’t do it for them, and I can’t see this broadly unpopular ‘win’ being it either, but really what else is there that he can point to at this stage?

echodot,

The current policy at this point seems to be hope something happens that makes the public see them in a good light.

They had hoped that labor would get themselves a bit of a mess about anti-Semitism over Israel. That hasn’t really worked because their own party has shot them in the foot on that one, by calling protesters radicals. They really are their own worst enemies.

astreus,

The idea that a government can instruct the courts to ignore human rights legislation shows how fundamentally broken the liberal “democracy” system is.

This from the government that just made saying “I am intolerant towards the idea of liberal parliamentary democracy” an example of extremism but saying “foreigners don’t deserve human rights” is not extremism.

echodot,

This isn’t a problem with democracy this is a problem with not having a democracy but claiming that one exists. You are angry about the wrong thing.

astreus,

You’re conflating liberal parliamentary representative democracy with all types of democracy - I was very specific in my post as to which I had the problem with (and it is equally as specific in the UK’s new definition of “extremism”).

I have no problem with democracy and do think it’s the best system. I have a problem with the idea that electing our overlords from a curated list with little to no fundamental difference (i.e. liberal parliamentary democracy) to then dictate to groups tens or hundreds of millions of people strong is democracy.

festus,

Please be specific about this being the UK’s democracy and not democracy in general. In Canada for example courts are stronger and it would be much more difficult (albeit not impossible) for our Parliament to do something like this.

astreus, (edited )

I don’t think the judges would like it, but what recourse would they have if the government passed an act such as this in Canada? I could see a judge saying this act breaches X treaties, but then just withdraw from the treaties (edit: which this act is likely a precursor to).

The system of parliamentary liberal democracy is an inherently flawed system.

festus,

The UK system has the concept that Parliament is the ultimate authority of matters. So courts there interpret laws but are unable to reject them.

Canada on the other hand has a constitution which lists different rights that people have, and Parliament has no authority to take away some of these rights. There is some controversial leeway with some of the rights where Parliament, using the ‘Notwithstanding clause’, is allowed to temporarily ignore some sections of the Constitution, but they have to keep renewing that every several years or else it expires, and it can’t be applied to some rights like voting rights.

Regarding this specific law I’m unsure of whether there’s anything in our constitution that would prevent deporting irregular migrants to a third country.

astreus,

Just reading it - the constitution of Canada is mostly about land and parliament setup more than anything else (though Constitution Act, 1960 & 1965 are kick-ass).

The rest is “unwritten” and “interpreted by courts” - exactly like the UK.

festus,

I’m referring to the the Charter of Rights and Freedoms from 1982. But yes there is still a lot of unwritten rules too like the UK.

barsoap,

In Germany judgements by the constitutional court are immediately applicable law. They can and do just say “this law is not to be applied” and the wider executive will do it no matter what the parliament or chancellery thinks about it.

They indeed are the most powerful institution in the country which is balanced by them not being able to do anything if noone files a case, as well as them not having any enforcement powers of their own. Ushers is as far as it goes.

astreus,

Germany, from my understanding, is a really different beast from most countries in how it works thanks to the East-West reunification.

That said, it sounds similar to the US Supreme Court, is that right? What are the checks and balances on this court? What’s to stop the bad actor work as seen in America?

captainlezbian,

In America? Honor system. No really, that’s our whole checks and balances thing. Nobody can remove the court, but they can choose it, pack it, and most importantly everyone has the ability to in unison ignore it. The courts have no armies, police, or jails, that’s the executive branch.

barsoap,

The constitutional order didn’t change with reunification: The east split up into states, which then simultaneously but individually joined the western federation. Pretty much the same thing as 1957, when Saarland joined the federation.

As to why we have better judges – part of it is cultural, but a lot institutional. They aren’t appointed for life but 12 year terms or until they’re 68, which ever comes first, they get elected with 2/3rd majorities, half by parliament, half by the Bundesrat (i.e. by the state governments). Oh: You actually need to be qualified: Either have passed the 2nd state examination in law (which qualifies you to be a regular judge), or be a professor of law. The net result is that the judges are first and foremost jurists, and very good ones at that, not party hacks. It also helps that the constitutional court is not an appellate court, they only do law review, not case review.

then_three_more,

Labour have already said they’ll reverse it once they win the next election. My bet would be they’ll get one plane off the ground. This fucking project is going to end up costing in excess of £5,000,000 per person. We could have just housed them in the Savoy for less.

Viking_Hippie,

I get what you’re saying, but never underestimate the ability of Blairites with none of the charisma to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Their ineptitude is a big part of the reason why the UK has been under the thumb of the Tories for 14 years…

then_three_more,

True. However that ineptitude has fully infected the Tories now. Labour are looking to win not from being any good or inspiring, but because the Tories are much much worse. Then the Tories will go off and lick their wounds for one or two terms and will be back because Labour won’t have the foresight to bring in PR and end the two party system for good.

echodot,

Haven’t they said that they actually do want to investigate changing the system? But they’ve said they don’t want it necessarily to be PR unless that’s what people want I think they were going on about a possible referendum.

Don’t say we’ve already had a referendum on it because we haven’t. That wasn’t a choice between first past the post and proportional representation it was a choice between keeping first past the post or single transferable vote, which is basically not an improvement.

then_three_more,

I think the reforms they’ve said have been pretty small so far. Reforming the lords. Hopefully when they’re going for a second term they’ll be more ambitious.

tacosanonymous,

Jbfc, that’s dark. wtf?

SteefLem,
@SteefLem@lemmy.world avatar

Im guessing his father in law has business there and needs ppl to work for cheap?

intrepid,

His FIL has enough slaves in his home town and is working on getting more indoctrinated.

Skua,

It wasn't actually originally Sunak's idea, this one was Johnson and Priti Patel. So probably not. Or at least, that wasn't the original motivation, I would not be surprised in the slightest to hear that they're moving to exploit it. Reporting in 2022 had said that other places had either been rejected for being unsuitable or had refused to agree to the deal, so it seems like Rwanda was basically just the one place that said yes. Being far from Britain, landlocked, and poor enough relative to Britain to be cheap to persuade (you know, if your idea of value for money is burning it to be a dickhead to refugees) makes it ideal as far as the creators of this policy see it

SteefLem,
@SteefLem@lemmy.world avatar

Its a weird deal. Ppl flee for war or whatever so lets send them to one of the most unstable countries in africa. So i just wonder, there has got to be more behind this. Like some of his “deals”

Viking_Hippie,

Yeah, people are being paid for sure. Plus the Tory bastards are openly saying that they’re doing it to discourage people from coming to the UK.

That of course implies that Rwanda is a sufficiently awful place that the risk isn’t worth the potential of getting to live in the UK. That’s pretty damn insulting to Rwanda and cruel towards migrants if true…

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