Sunak’s Rwanda Bill looks doomed

Rishi Sunak is pinning his hopes on emergency legislation, the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill, to ‘Stop the Boats’. But within hours of the Bill’s publication yesterday, immigration minister Robert Jenrick walked out. Last month, home secretary, Suella Braverman, was fired. To lose one minister may be regarded as misfortune, but to lose two means something is up. What is going on?

At the heart of the attempt to ‘Stop the Boats’ lies a very simple problem. If this Bill is to succeed, it needs to correct every weakness that the Supreme Court identified when it rejected the government’s last attempt to legislate on this issue. Last month’s ruling was unanimous: judges said that the Rwanda scheme (under which asylum seekers would be sent to Rwanda to have their claims decided there) is unlawful. The Supreme Court decided that there were substantial grounds for believing that asylum seekers sent to Rwanda would face a real risk of ill-treatment as a result of ‘refoulement’ (being returned) to their country of origin.