My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, for tabling these two Motions to allow your Lordships’ House to consider the Rwanda treaty before we have to consider the Rwanda Bill. As noble Lords have said, the treaty and the Bill are consequential on the Supreme Court judgment that Rwanda cannot be assumed to be a safe place. This is, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, indicated, an exceptional report. Its findings are very grave indeed. Next week, we will be asked in the Rwanda Bill to accept that Rwanda is a safe place, despite the fact that the evidence does not exist, as my noble friend Lord Alton just graphically illustrated.
The Home Secretary says in the Bill that he is unable to make a statement that the Bill is compliant with the Human Rights Act. That in itself should cause your Lordships alarm. We have obligations under not only the Human Rights Act but international legal instruments, and this is not the first occasion on which this Government have produced legislation which is not compatible with our international and domestic legal obligations. I think of the legacy Act currently being challenged in the High Court in Northern Ireland. Actions such as the introduction of the Rwanda Bill, which relies on a treaty which the Government have only just signed and which provides for a very complex structure of mechanisms to make it work at all, which will require the identification of personnel, accommodation, IT systems, training, new asylum law and many other processes, none of which exist at present, do further grave damage to the United Kingdom’s international reputation. What is so stark, on reading the report of the International Agreements Committee, is the manifest lack of ability, capacity and preparedness to make the provisions of the treaty operational in the near future, in addition to its other deficiencies.
That there is a problem of uncontrolled unlawful migration cannot be denied. However, the Government’s response over past years has been generally to reduce the number of staff employed to deal with asylum matters and the general resources provided for these matters, and above all, the failure, as my noble friend Lord Alton said, to devise a workable, human rights-compliant strategy to resettle displaced people and, more importantly, to work internationally to create levels of peace and prosperity in the countries from which so many of these migrants come.
We granted more than 500,000 asylum applications this year, 70% of the total number of applications. In contrast, some 25,000 illegal immigrants arrived in small boats last year. In future, we are planning to send such people out to Rwanda before their asylum status has been determined if they enter through what are called
“dangerous, illegal and unnecessary methods”.
Already this year, 614 people are reported to have arrived in 15 boats, which is about 40 people a boat. Their status is then to be determined in Rwanda and there is an agreement that they will not be deported by Rwanda unless the UK asks for them to be sent back to the UK. However, there is evidence that Rwanda has deported to Uganda people who arrived there
under comparable arrangements. Moreover, if they are not granted refugee status in Rwanda, their future will be very bleak indeed. It will not be possible under the proposed processes to track and monitor what happens to them. The proposals for tracking and monitoring are time-limited and are currently an aspiration rather than a reality.
In a very unstructured and knee-jerk way, we are attempting to limit the number of people coming to our shores. In so doing we have spent hundreds of millions of pounds. We have paid many millions to France—I think it will be half a billion pounds over the three years ending in 2026—yet those seeking to come unlawfully to the UK are still able to set off from France, with an average of 40 people in a standard inflatable. Many of those inflatables have come under significant pressure, and people have died as a consequence.
Getting 40 people into an inflatable and setting it on course for England cannot achieved speedily. It must be possible for the French to do more in return for the money that we have given them. Through the use of drones or helicopters, allowing for intervention on French soil, a positive and proactive French response in this context would undoubtedly have a deterrent effect.
Moreover, we are spending millions on policing the channel. We no longer have the coastal vessels necessary for these channel operations, because their replacement was delayed by the Government; so we are now hiring private vessels to do the work, at a cost of £36 million in a year. Work to replace these vessels will not start for another two years and is not expected to be completed before 2028, so we will spend another £200 million picking people out of the Channel. That is in addition to the money we are spending each day on accommodating people and providing the necessary resources for their processing and appeals, et cetera.
The solutions proposed in this treaty, even if they were acceptable in human rights terms—and there is no evidence that they are so acceptable—have yet to be realised in any degree. The committee has identified very significant matters that require to be addressed before the UK can have any confidence that the structures will actually work, that Rwanda will be a safe place for migrants to be processed, and that the UK can be satisfied that migrants will not simply be deported to third countries, in breach of the requirements of the treaty.
If the UK has such difficulty in providing accommodation, education, healthcare and all the other services that are necessary, can the Minister explain how the UK can expect that Rwanda will be able to do so? Most particularly, to echo the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, how can he assure the House that children and vulnerable adults will be kept safe under these arrangements?
The committee has said:
“The Government has presented the Rwanda Treaty to Parliament as an answer to the Supreme Court judgment and has asked Parliament, on the basis of the Treaty, to declare that Rwanda is a safe country. While the Treaty might in time provide the basis for such an assessment if it is rigorously implemented, as things
stand the arrangements it provides for are incomplete. A significant number of further legal and practical steps are required under the treaty”.
The committee gives, as examples, the new asylum law that is required, as well as
“a system for ensuring that refoulement does not take place; … a process for submitting individual complaints to the Monitoring Committee”—
which is yet to get its support people—
“the appointment of independent experts to advise the asylum First Instance and Appeals Bodies; … the appointment of co-presidents of the Appeals Body; … the appointment of international judges; …training for international judges in Rwandan law and practice; … training for Rwandan officials dealing with asylum applicants; and … steps to ensure a sufficient number of trained legal advisers and interpreters are available”.
Can the Minister tell the House the timetable for the creation and establishment of all these structures and when they will be delivered in a way that will enable the House to have confidence that people who are sent to Rwanda will be safe? Even after all that work has been done, there will have to be further work to ensure that what has been established actually works.
Your Lordships have heard repeatedly that there is no evidence that Rwanda is currently a safe place. The structures provided in this treaty are, quite simply, not operational at present, and not capable of being operational. For that reason, I will vote to support the Motion that the Government should not ratify the treaty until the protections that it provides have been fully implemented.
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