Former immigration minister Robert Jenrick spoke to Laura Kuensberg on the BBC on Sunday. Photo: Geoff Overs/BBC/PA
Robert Jenrick, the former immigration minister, said he would not support Rishi Sunak's Rwanda Bill when it comes before the House of Commons this week.
In a strongly worded rebuttal to the Prime Minister he said it was “very clear” to those who understood the problems that the bill “won't work”.
Mr Sunak accused Mr Jenrick of failing to understand the problem in their exchange letters after the immigration minister resigned on Wednesday hours after the draft bill was published.
Mr Sunak rejected claims the bill could fail due to numerous individual legal challenges to the law from migrants, saying they would be “vanishingly” small, and warned the deportation scheme could collapse if the government goes further out -for Rwanda's objections to any violation. in the field of international law.
However, he faces the double threat of a rebellion over the legislation from the right of his party, who are unhappy that the bill does not go far enough in addressing concerns from individual migrants. Strasbourg judges and centrists fear he goes too far in testing domestic and international human rights law.
A “star chamber” of Conservative lawyers advising the right-wing party has concluded the bill is flawed to avoid legal action from illegal migrants, while centrist group One Nation is due to receive its legal opinion on the bill on Monday from the Lords . CC Garnier, former attorney general.
'The Bill is not doing his job'.
Speaking on the BBC with Laura Kuensberg on Sunday, Mr Jenrick said a political choice had been made to “put forward a bill who doesn't do his job.” I don't do work.”
He warned that section four of the bill, allowing migrants to challenge their deportation on an individual basis, “will lead to a series of legal challenges that will bog down our scheme and fail to create the deterrent that [the Prime Minister] and I have set out.” achieve this.
“The test of this is not whether you can make one or two symbolic flights before the next election with a handful of illegal migrants on board.”
Indicating that he would abstain, When the bill comes before the House of Commons for second reading on Tuesday, he said: “I will not support this bill. But I think we can fix it.”
He said the government had stopped the boats “in three strikes and done”, given that it had already introduced two laws on illegal migration. “I want this bill to work and create a powerful deterrent. I'm afraid it's very clear to all those people who really understand how this system works that this bill will not succeed,” he said.
“What will happen is that absolutely everyone who gets caught on a small boat , will claim that Rwanda is generally safe, but for individual reasons it is not safe for them.
The bill blocks any systemic actions. challenge under domestic and international law and violates the Human Rights Act. It also gives ministers the power to override so-called Rule 39 bans of the European Court of Human Rights, which were used to block the first flight to Rwanda in June 2022.
ECHR – 'a debate for another day'
Mr Jenrick said that while there were strong arguments for withdrawing from the European Convention on Human Rights, that was a “debate for another day”. He is pushing for changes that would exempt the UK from such bans.
“There are compelling legal arguments for doing everything I propose while maintaining our obligations under international law,” he said .
“We were not sent to parliament to worry about our reputation internationally. It is vital that we address this issue because in my work, day in and day out, I have seen the untold damage that these small boats cause to our country, the community cohesion problems we see, the billions of pounds that are spent on hotels.”
Michael Gove, the Leveling Up Secretary, said the bill was “tough and robust” and that the number of successful deportation challenges would be “very small”, noting that the threshold for challenges required convincing evidence that migrants are at immediate risk of serious and irreversible harm.
“The black and white letter of this law makes it clear that the number of individual cases that can be relied upon is very small,” he said, adding that the effectiveness of the bill was supported by senior lawyers, including a former Supreme Court judge. Lord Sumption and former justice secretary Lord Wolfson.
Mr Gove insisted the Tories were not considering a general election if they failed to get the bill through Parliament.
“ No, we are not considering that because I am sure that when people look at the legislation and have a chance to reflect, they will understand that it is a tough measure, but at the same time it is proportionate,” he told Sky.
Damian Green, who leads the One Nation Conservatives, said they would meet on Monday to decide whether to oppose the legislation over concerns about breaking international law and making Rwanda “safe”.
< p>The former de facto Deputy Prime Minister downplayed the importance of the “very, very small number” of his colleagues who are campaigning for a new leader.
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