– long read, been cogitating over this a while!
For those outside the U.K. this is a plan to deport people arriving in the U.K. by illegal routes, specifically on “small boats” from France, to Rwanda; an impoverished country with a dubious human rights record and a history of GENOCIDE, without any assessment of their asylum status as required under international human rights legislation.
In brief
100% Immoral, unethical, inhumane and cruel
100% A Kafkaesque nightmare
100% Almost certainly illegal, in and out of British courts for TWO YEARS
100% Hugely expensive cost £1.8m for each asylum seeker
100% Definitely impractical
As yet no company, I understand, has agreed to make their planes available. This is revealing, “Rwandan state airline ‘turns down’ UK proposal to transport asylum seekers — The airline was worried about ‘potential damage to their brand’, according to reports” Leaving the government to consider a charter from the MOD.
Rwanda has reportedly sold two thirds of accommodation earmarked for people “removed” from the U.K. Though the Rwandan government deny this.
The Home Office has only managed to assess a fraction of people seeking asylum or those, in their minds, eligible for this immoral, unethical, inhumane and cruel plan.
And furthermore “the capacity of the proposed facility in Rwanda is 200 people annually, representing just 0.7% of 2023 small boat arrivals.”
Yet the British prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, stated in April, “The numbers will start off small but there will be a regular rhythm of flights… thousands of people will eventually be removed to Rwanda and the deterrent effect will kick in,” at a “late-night showdown” over the Rwanda Bill in parliament.
The government continue to assert it’s happening, in April a spokesperson said: “We have robust operational plans in place to get flights off the ground to Rwanda in spring.” See source above.
We are being lied to over this issue on a daily basis by this government. This government, so reluctant to “tax and spend”, which is the job of government in my opinion, are spending much need resources, time, energy and tax money on this rather than our schools, housing, prisons, social services, hospitals and highways.
FACT: Only 0.3% of people currently in the U.K. arrived by “small boats”
According to government figures, “In 2022, 89,000 people requested asylum, 45% of those arrived on “small boats” and “Asylum seekers are 0.6% of the UK’s total population.” yougov.co.uk
In 2023 it’s widely reported 29,437 migrants arrived on the Kent coast from France in small boats – about a third fewer than the figure for the previous year.
All this parliamentary TIME, ENERGY and MONEY over 0.3% of the U.K. population.
Such is the trust in our prime minister Full Fact are fact checking him on the issue. Sunak claims the passage of the bill acts as a deterrent yet figures for this year again from Full Fact suggest otherwise “provisional figures show that over the first quarter of 2024 5,435 people arrived by small boat, compared to 3,793 in the first quarter of 2023—an increase of 43%.”
The majority of asylum seekers historically have arrived by illegal methods because there are few legal routes and because when people war, conflict or persecution there’s rarely time to pick up documentation.
Meanwhile Freedom from Torture have launched a campaign to pressure pressuring carrier MOD AirTanker to rule themselves out as for the transportation of asylum seekers to Kigali.
And now this in the Guardian on the 19th May this year
“The Rwandan government has barred a senior human rights researcher from entering the country, prompting accusations that officials are seeking to dodge independent scrutiny just weeks before the UK government is due to send asylum seekers there for the first time.
Rwandan immigration authorities denied entry to Clementine de Montjoye, a senior researcher in Human Rights Watch’s Africa division, when she arrived at Kigali International Airport on 13 May.
The east African government has defended its actions by accusing Human Rights Watch (HRW), which works in more than 90 countries, of fabricating its research.”
I feel I need say no more. Actually I will this is not just a human rights assault but a crisis of democracy. Any government that has to go up against its own courts, time and again, amending proposed legislation to pursue a scheme which can only produce unaccountable distress to people who are already traumatised, who in the process neglect the issues that people really care about, that stir up far right protests at asylum hostels and hotels do not deserve to be in power. And where is the opposition on this?
Sadly though Starmer “has pledged to scrap the government’s Rwanda scheme “straight away” if his party wins the election.” He went on to say, “he will establish a new Border Security Command to work with Border Force, MI5 and the National Crime Agency on prosecuting gangs operating small boat routes.”
In other words keep them out, maintain little Britain, no one is welcome here even if you are fleeing war, conflict, persecution! No mention of legal routes.
As the world changes, tectonic plates shifting geopolitically, as the world warms it’s time for the West to take account of its colonial past, the effect of its emissions and the wars which are the legacy of borders created by the West or Global South and stand up and take responsibility and show some humanity.
A blog post by Anne Enith Cooper
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