Could Shami Chakrabarti torpedo Priti Patel’s Rwanda bill?

Priti Patel’s reforms to the rights of asylum seekers have predictably scandalised the House of Lords. Befitting what is now effectively a club for patricians and liberals who hate Boris Johnson, it duly sent her Nationality and Borders Bill back badly mauled. The Commons excised these amendments in short order; today, the Lords will be asked to restore them. But will it do what it’s supposed to? This is a dangerous moment for the government – not least because Shami Chakrabarti’s proposed amendment could torpedo the whole project.

This is because the most sweetly reasonable change her fix is trying to make is also the most potentially catastrophic. For over 70 years the UK, like many other nations, has been party to the 1951 Geneva Refugee Convention, dealing with when rights to asylum arise. This is a Convention that some have rightly seen as outdated and too conducive to widespread immigration abuse in an era of mass travel and people-trafficking: but unless and until we denounce it we’re stuck with it.