29 June 2023 , 09:12
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The Government's plans to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda is in tatters after top judges ruled it was unlawful - saying it could not be considered a "safe third country".
In a humiliating blow for Suella Braverman, campaigners and asylum seekers won a Court of Appeal challenge over the controversial scheme, which opponents dismiss as a "vanity project".
Top judges dramatically overturned a High Court ruling saying the scheme - branded "cruel" and "immoral" by campaigners - was legal.
The landmark ruling comes after more than 14 months of deadlock since the deal with Rwanda was first unveiled by former Home Secretary Priti Patel last year.
Human rights groups have voiced their horror over the plans, and this week it emerged it would cost the UK a staggering £169,000 per person flown to the African nation.
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Ministers now face pressure to drop the costly project altogether, but the Government will challenge the ruling at the Supreme Court.
Rishi Sunak said he "fundamentally" disagrees with the Court of Appeal conclusion on the Government's Rwanda policy, while bitter Ms Braverman whined: "The system is rigged against the British people."
Home Secretary Suella Braverman is an enthusiastic backer of the project (Pete Stonier / Stoke Sentinel)Yvette Cooper, Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary, said: “Today’s judgment shows that Rishi Sunak has no plan to fix the Tories’ small boats chaos and his only idea is completely unravelling.
“Ministers were forced to admit this week that it will cost £169,000 to send each person to Rwanda on top of the £140m of taxpayers’ money they have already spent. Now the court has found that ministers didn't even do the basic work to make sure the scheme was legal or safe.
“Time and again, ministers have gone for gimmicks instead of getting a grip, and slogans instead of solutions, while the Tory boats chaos has got worse.
"The Rwanda scheme is unworkable, unethical and extortionate, a costly and damaging distraction from the urgent action the government should be taking."
But despite growing pressure to drop the scheme, Mr Sunak vowed to continue fighting - although it is likely the case will not be heard until at least the autumn.
In a statement, he said: "I strongly believe the Rwandan government has provided the assurances necessary to ensure there is no real risk that asylum-seekers relocated under the Rwanda policy would be wrongly returned to third countries - something that the Lord Chief Justice agrees with.
Rishi Sunak has vowed to carry on fighting for the controversial project (UK PARLIAMENT/AFP via Getty Imag)"Rwanda is a safe country. The High Court agreed. The UNHCR have their own refugee scheme for Libyan refugees in Rwanda. We will now seek permission to appeal this decision to the Supreme Court.
"The policy of this government is very simple, it is this country - and your government - who should decide who comes here, not criminal gangs. And I will do whatever is necessary to make that happen."
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Steve Smith, chief executive of refugee charity Care4Calais, said: “We have always believed that the Government’s Rwanda policy is cruel, immoral and that it is not a safe country to remove refugees to.
"We are immensely relieved to hear that the Court of Appeal agrees. Survivors of war, torture and human rights abuses have had great pain and torment inflicted on them by our Government threatening them with removal to Rwanda."
And he continued: “After today’s judgement, it’s time the Government abandoned its brutal Rwanda policy and any alternative proposal to shirk the UK’s responsibility for people seeking asylum."
Lord Burnett, who heard the appeal with Sir Geoffrey Vos and Lord Justice Underhill, said the court ruled by a majority that the policy of removing asylum seekers to Rwanda is unlawful.
He told the court Sir Geoffrey and Lord Justice Underhill concluded that deficiencies in the asylum system in Rwanda mean there is a "real risk" asylum seekers could be returned to their home country and face persecution.
He added the two judges found that: "In that sense Rwanda is not a 'safe third country'."
Lord Burnett, who disagreed with the other two judges, said that sending anyone to Rwanda "would constitute a breach of article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights".
He pointed out that the Government is legally required to comply.
The deal with the Rwandan government was announced on April 14 last year (EUGENE UWIMANA/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)Lib Dem Home Affairs spokesperson Alistair Carmichael said: “Not only is the Conservatives’ Rwanda asylum plan immoral, ineffective and incredibly costly for taxpayers, but the Court of Appeal has also now said it is unlawful, too.
“It will do nothing to stop dangerous Channel crossings - and it runs roughshod over the UK’s legal obligations, as the courts have confirmed.
“The Home Secretary needs to finally accept reality. Instead of wasting even more taxpayer money by defending this plan in the courts, the Home Secretary should scrap her vanity project and focus on tackling the asylum backlog created by her own Government’s incompetence.”
The legal challenge was mounted by charities and asylum seekers who argued that the High Court - which previously said the scheme was legal - "showed excessive deference" to the Home Office.
And appeal judges were told that material provided by the Rwandan authorities "lacked credibility, consisting of blanket denials and clear contradictions".
The UK Government has already handed over £140million to Rwanda before a single flight has taken off.
MPs have voiced scepticism over whether it will deter people arriving by small boat - as the Government claims - and there are questions over capacity.
Charity Freedom from Torture, which intervened in the appeal, also argued the speed of the process means there is no "adequate opportunity" to identify torture survivors.
Sonya Sceats, chief executive of Freedom from Torture, said today: "This is a victory for reason and compassion. We are delighted that the appeal verdict has affirmed what the caring people of this country already knew: the UK government’s ‘cash for humans’ deal with Rwanda is not only deeply immoral, it flies in the face of the laws of this country.
“Every day in Freedom from Torture’s therapy rooms, torture survivors confide in our clinicians their fears this expulsion scheme has generated amongst people seeking safety in this country. As we outlined in our intervention in the Court of Appeal, this dirty deal with Rwanda does too little to identify and protect survivors and other vulnerable groups and would see them placed at risk of further harm."
The Government has already spent at least £1.3 million fighting legal battles over the Rwanda scheme, which has been branded a clear breach of the Refugee Convention by the UN.
The ruling is a hammer blow for Suella Braverman, pictured in Kigali earlier this year (PA)The Rwandan Government said it took "issue" with the Court of Appeal's ruling as it described the east African nation as "one of the safest countries in the world".
Government spokeswoman Yolande Makolo said: "While this is ultimately a decision for the UK's judicial system, we do take issue with the ruling that Rwanda is not a safe country for asylum seekers and refugees.
"Rwanda is one of the safest countries in the world and we have been recognised by the UNHCR and other international institutions for our exemplary treatment of refugees."
The Government is under huge pressure after Rishi Sunak made stopping small boat arrivals one of his five top priorities.
An impact assessment document published by the Home Office this week admitted that Government doesn't know whether the costly plans will help Rishi Sunak to achieve his pledge to "stop the boats".
The document said it is "not possible to estimate with precision the level of deterrence that the [Illegal Migration] Bill might achieve".
At least 37% of small boat arrivals would have to be deterred for there to be no additional cost to the taxpayer, the report said, but warned that the effects of the bill were “highly uncertain”.
Former Home Secretary Priti Patel unveiled the "biggest overhaul of our immigration system in decades" on April 14 last year.
But MPs have questioned whether it'll deter small boat crossings and her successor, Suella Braverman, has refused to give a timetable for flights.
The Government has repeatedly refused to tell The Mirror how much it has spent, although it is known that it has so far paid £140 million to the Rwandan government.
In April - a year since the project was first announced - Labour's Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper branded the project a "Tory con".
She told The Mirror: “Every day spent on this failing policy could have been spent doing the things that will actually work to clear the backlog and reduce crossings – things Labour has been calling for repeatedly."
And she continued: “Ministers have been so Rwanda obsessed, they’ve failed to do anything serious to tackle the problem.
"They’ve spent loads of money on this extortionately expensive, failing scheme which is only likely to cover a few hundred people and risks making trafficking worse, instead of going after the criminal gangs, getting a proper deal with France and sorting out the chaos in the asylum system.
"It's Government by gimmick and British taxpayers deserve so much better."