The Supreme Court has ruled against Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda migrants scheme in a major blow to the Prime Minister after Suella Braverman warned he has no credible Plan B stop the boats. The Mail has more.
Justices at the U.K.’s highest court unanimously upheld an earlier High Court judgment on legislation announced 18 months ago to send asylum seekers who arrive in the U.K. by unauthorised means to Kigali to have their claims heard there.
The defeat will further frustrate what Downing Street admits is a “crucial” part of his plans to halt Channel crossings and inflame the row with Mrs Braverman, who was sacked Home Secretary on Monday.
It will also revive demands by Tory Right-wingers to leave the European Convention on Human Rights.
Ministers had vowed to press on with the scheme regardless of the result today, with options including elevating the Rwanda deal to a treaty ratified in Parliament – making it harder for the courts to block – and passing emergency legislation to disapply human rights laws.
In a summary of the judgment, President of the Supreme Court Lord Reed said there would be a risk of genuine asylum seekers being returned by Rwanda to the home country they fled from.
Lord Reed said the “legal test” in the case was whether there were “substantial grounds” for believing that asylum seekers sent to Rwanda would be at “real risk” of being sent back to the countries they came from where they could face “ill treatment”.
He said: “In the light of the evidence which I have summarised, the Court of Appeal concluded that there were such grounds.
“We are unanimously of the view that they were entitled to reach that conclusion. Indeed, having been taken through the evidence ourselves, we agree with their conclusion.” …
In an excoriating letter to the Prime Minister yesterday, Mrs Braverman warned he has no “credible Plan B” if an earlier High Court ruling that the policy is unlawful is upheld.
As of November 12th, 27,284 people had crossed the Channel.
Meanwhile, the “legacy” backlog of U.K. asylum applications stood at 33,253 as of October 29th, down nearly a half (47%) from 62,157 on July 30th, according to new figures from the Home Office.
Mrs Braverman’s replacement, James Cleverly, outlined the possible outcomes during the first meeting of the Prime Minister’s new-look Cabinet after the dramatic reshuffle that saw Mrs Braverman shown the door.
Senior ministers had wargamed responses to a defeat, but Mrs Braverman warned of a “betrayal” of Mr. Sunak’s promise to do “whatever it takes” to stop the crossings regardless.
Worth reading in full.
This means that the one plan anyone had come up with that might – despite being watered down – possibly prevent mass illegal immigration has been ruled unlawful by the country’s top court.
The problem it appears is that under existing law it is not permitted to have policies which, in the opinion of the judiciary, create a “real risk” of returning genuine asylum seekers to their own countries. To escape this trap, which seems to rule out all available and effective means of securing the country’s borders, it will be necessary for the Government either to establish a different, weaker test in law (which will mean disapplying the ECHR, perhaps removing the test altogether), or to insist that Parliament’s assessment of the risk should take precedence over that of the judiciary. Alternatively, since the court has suggested the problem is specifically with the current state of Rwanda’s asylum system, the Government could try to find a different third country with an asylum system that meets with the judiciary’s approval.
The Government will now likely conclude that if the law does not permit any practical way of preventing mass illegal immigration then there is something wrong with the law. But will the PM have the gumption to do “whatever it takes” to change the law and secure the U.K.’s borders?
Stop Press: Rishi Sunak has released a statement in response to the ruling.
We have seen today’s judgment and will now consider next steps.
This was not the outcome we wanted, but we have spent the last few months planning for all eventualities and we remain completely committed to stopping the boats.
Crucially, the Supreme Court – like the Court of Appeal and the High Court before it – has confirmed that the principle of sending illegal migrants to a safe third country for processing is lawful. This confirms the Government’s clear view from the outset.
Illegal migration destroys lives and costs British taxpayers millions of pounds a year. We need to end it and we will do whatever it takes to do so.
Because when people know that if they come here illegally, they won’t get to stay then they will stop coming altogether, and we will stop the boats.
Does the Government have a different third country in mind? If so, it has never mentioned it. Or is the plan to sort out the Rwandan asylum system in double time? That would seem unrealistic.
All eyes on Sunak’s next move.
Stop Press 2: The Rwandan Government has objected to the decision, saying: “We do take issue with the ruling that Rwanda is not a safe third country for asylum seekers and refugees.”
Stop Press 3: At Prime Minster’s Questions Sunak has said that the Government will finalise a new treaty with Rwanda to pave the way for deportations. At a later press conference he said:
I do not agree with this decision but I respect it and accept it. The rule of law is fundamental to our democracy. We have prepared for all outcomes of this case. And so we have been working on a new international treaty with Rwanda.
This will provide a guarantee in law that those who are relocated from the U.K. to Rwanda will be protected against removal from Rwanda and it will make clear that we will bring back anyone if ordered to do so by a court.
We will finalise this treaty in light of today’s judgment and ratify it without delay.
But we need to end the merry-go-round. I said I was going to fundamentally change our country, and I meant it. So I’m also announcing today that we will take the extraordinary step of introducing emergency legislation. This will enable Parliament to confirm that with our new treaty, Rwanda is safe.
Meanwhile, Boris Johnson has said Sunak should ask Parliament to change the law to designate Rwanda a “safe” country under the Asylum and Immigration Act 2004. Law specialist Richard Ekins, on the other hand, argues that the Government should “abandon a policy of outsourcing asylum claims to Rwanda and instead to adopt a policy of offshoring, whereby U.K. officials process claims outside the U.K., whether in Rwanda or in a British overseas territory, with genuine refugees then settled in safe third countries”.
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Good morning to everyone wherever you are.
Morning Judy, another fine day here in sunny Yorkshire..it’s about four sunny days on the trot…I suppose we will have to call it summer…LOL!
Nah, four days of sunshine in Yorkshire, it’s global warming. Come on ebygum – get with the programme
….yes, I’m in the garden now planting Cactus!! Hahaha…..
Good morning Judy.
Thank you but I see the downtickers are still here.
The Delingpod: A James Delingpole Podcast
https://rumble.com/v17zvd1-naomi-wolf.html
Naomi Wolf
Stand for freedom & make friends with our Yellow Boards By The Road
Tuesday 14th June 2022 11am to 12pm
Yellow Boards
Junction A321 Sandhurst Rd
& B3016 Finchampstead Rd
Wokingham RG40 3JS
Friday 17th June 3.30pm to 4.30pm
Yellow Boards
Junction A330 Cock Lane &
B3022 Bracknell Lane Warfield,
Bracknell RG42 6JE
Stand in the Park Sundays from 10.30am – make friends & keep sane
Wokingham
Howard Palmer Gardens
Sturges Rd RG40 2HD
Bracknell
South Hill Park, Rear Lawn, RG12 7PA
Henley
Mills Meadows (bandstand) RG9 1DS
Telegram http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
Another typo LS:
A330 Cocks Lane, B3022 Bracknell Road, Warfield.
A nightmare of a crossroads junction with limited visibility, not sure the wisest place to do these kinds of protests especially with all the Ascot traffic this week
I’m not saying this is anything but in light of stories we’ve read recently about pilots and heart problems it’s interesting..they don’t give any reasons for the ‘recent crashes’…..??
Navy aviation units hold safety pauseBy Commander, Naval Air Forces Public Affairs11 June 2022
SAN DIEGO — As a result of recent crashes involving U.S. Navy and Marine Corps aircraft, Commander, Naval Air Forces has directed all non-deployed Navy aviation units to conduct a safety pause on June 13 in order to review risk-management practices and conduct training on threat and error-management processes.
ATL story about inflation rates soaring……more self-inflicted misery, it will get here shortly, no doubt….
https://powerthefuture.com/two-thirds-of-the-country-face-the-prospect-of-blackouts-this-summer/
The tough news keeps coming for Americans struggling with high energy prices. Not only have gas prices broken records for the past several weeks, now a good portion of the country is being told they should expect rolling blackouts, as we enter the hot summer months. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) officially released its summer report last week and almost two-thirds of the country should prepare for a possible blackout.
The report from NERC includes a harrowing map that shows most of the nation should stand ready for possible blackouts this summer.
The reason for these coming blackouts is clear: a mandated transition to clean energy. The Wall Street Journal editorial board writes:
And re the other hemisphere, the beeb world service broadcast a similar item about Australia this winter (i.e. now). Apparently, a fair bit of electricity is generated by coal and gas down under. Not clear if it’s a shortage of coal, or just out of date and poorly maintained systems.
Good morning all from sunny Northamptonshire!
Nowt to do with ATL but important none the less.
The brilliant Anna de Buisseret shared this link to n international group of Truth Warriors I’m privileged to belong to, of John O’Looney speaking in Leicester.
https://www.facebook.com/100078231423435/posts/pfbid0c6Js7Qk3EWwA14eyHKencbSVzXGPAJFcjPT4vkFzp4t93N79D2xf62mrG1crcJgYl/?d=n
Stunning response from John o. Looney. So very true.
I hope he continues with speaking out.
He is doing. He has integrity & his moral compass is true.
He’s bloody brave. They tried to kill him when he was hospitalised.
I know. He spoke to our group about two weeks after Dr Peter Chan rescued him from hospital. What he didn’t say in the video was that there were 3 other men admitted who were put onto the protocol of remdesivir. He didn’t sleep that night as he was terrified that they would inject him against his will with the drugs & listened to them desperately struggling for breath. One was wheeled off when the porters came in the morning, curtains closed so that nobody saw & the other two just disappeared.
It is beyond belief. I have huge respect for him.
God evening BB.
Latest ONS weekly death publication just out
Deaths registered weekly in England and Wales, provisional: week ending 3 June 2022
However it’s affected by the bank holidays on 2nd and 3rd June so no real insights from registration date death data
The weekly deaths by occurrence date shouldn’t have been massively affected, however ONS seem to have made an error in their estimates (see attached chart where you can see the completely implausible drop in the last week) so we will have to wait at least a week to see if all cause deaths are now falling below normal levels after the elevated period of all cause mortality coinciding with the Spring boosters.
We’ll see in the next week or two. It could be that many certificates have been ‘carried forward’ due to the short working week, which could result in a spike later on.
Deleted to save moderators doing it. Please collect £5
And Pfizer enters the running for best made up last minute document for VRBPAC race!
https://jessicar.substack.com/p/and-fizer-enters-the-running-for?s=r
Guess who’s talking:
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/guess-whos-talking/
The further erosion of sovereignty in the EU
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20220603IPR32122/parliament-activates-process-to-change-eu-treaties