Robert Jenrick, the Immigration Minister, resigned on Wednesday after a last-ditch attempt by the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, to save his Rwanda asylum policy with ’emergency’ legislation sparked a right-wing Conservative backlash.
Sunak issued a “unite or die” plea to Tory MPs along with a new bill that would legally classify Rwanda as a “safe” country, a measure he claimed would pave the way for migrants to be sent to the African nation.
But Jenrick claimed in a resignation letter that Sunak’s plan represented “a triumph of hope over experience”, while former home secretary Suella Braverman warned that the Tories were heading for “electoral oblivion”.
The bill orders the courts to ignore the UK Human Rights Act and international law, including the UN Refugee Convention, when considering whether Rwanda is safe for asylum seekers, a move that has drawn criticism from lawyers.
Jenrick had called for a tougher approach and resigned. A right-wing Tory insider said Jenrick had warned Number 10 this week that he had ‘legal advice saying it wouldn’t work, but the Prime Minister ignored him’.
In his resignation letter, he said he did not want to be “another politician who makes promises to the British public on immigration and then fails to keep them”. Jenrick has long been one of Sunak’s closest supporters.
An ally of Braverman, whom Sunak sacked as home secretary last month, said the bill was “fatally flawed”, adding: “The prime minister has retained the ability for each and every illegal immigrant to make individual human rights claims against their deportation, and then to appeal those claims if they don’t succeed initially.”
A right-wing former Tory minister said some colleagues were tabling letters of no confidence in Sunak, and the episode has further weakened a leader whose party trails the opposition Labour Party by about 20 points in the polls.
Sunak’s allies said the bill was “the maximum we can do” and the prime minister wrote to Jenrick on Wednesday to argue that Rwanda would have pulled the plug on the migrant deal if Britain had breached its international legal obligations.
“The Rwandan government has been clear that it would not accept the UK basing this programme on legislation that could be seen as a breach of our international legal obligations,” he said.
Vincent Biruta, Rwanda’s foreign minister, issued a statement reiterating his concerns. “Without lawful behaviour by the UK, Rwanda would not be able to proceed with the Migration and Economic Development Partnership,” he said.
Yvette Cooper, Labour’s home affairs spokeswoman, ridiculed Sunak. “The only thing stopping the British government from ignoring international law is the Rwandan government,” she said.
Sunak pleaded with his party to get behind the bill as the best chance of getting flights to Rwanda, but he needs to regain control of the situation quickly. Aides said the prime minister reminded MPs of his ‘unite or die’ message to his party last October.
The Security of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill is wide-ranging and represents Sunak’s attempt to address last month’s High Court ruling that the Rwanda scheme was unlawful.
This week, Home Office minister James Cleverly signed a treaty with Rwanda to underpin the government’s claim that the East African country is safe for asylum seekers. The deal states that Rwanda will not return migrants to their countries of origin where they may face persecution.
The legislation’s provisions include an order that UK courts “shall not take into account” any interim decisions by the European Court of Human Rights, which in 2022 blocked the deportation of an asylum seeker to Rwanda ahead of a full UK court hearing. It says decisions on whether to comply with interim decisions are for ministers, a power included in the Illegal Immigration Act passed earlier this year.
“The UK government is attempting to overturn an evidence-based finding of fact by the Supreme Court and, through this legislation, to insulate itself from accountability under both domestic and international law,” said Nick Emmerson, president of the Law Society of England and Wales.
Cleverly writes in an explanatory note on the first page of the Bill that he is “unable to make a declaration” that the Bill is compatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, but he intends to proceed anyway.
Sunak told Jenrick that the bill was “the toughest piece of illegal immigration legislation ever put forward by a UK government” and that the outgoing minister’s decision was based on “a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation”.
Many lawyers expect the policy to be challenged in the courts. Ministers fear that Sunak’s hopes of sending migrants to Rwanda before the next general election are unlikely to be realised. “It won’t happen,” said one.
The bill is also expected to face opposition in the House of Lords. Veteran British diplomat Lord John Kerr, who sits on the Lords International Agreements Committee, said the bill would do “immense damage” to Britain’s reputation.
Sunak has tried to steer a middle course between MPs on the Tory right, who want Britain out of the ECHR, and moderates who insist Britain should honour its commitments.
While Sunak’s allies believe a Tory revolt over the Rwanda legislation can be contained, he now has a number of high-profile and vocal opponents ready to denounce his efforts to deal with Britain’s migration problem.