Peers inflict huge defeat on Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda Bill as House of Lords renews assault on PM’s flagship laws to ‘Stop the Boats’

Peers today inflicted a huge defeat on the Government’s Rwanda Bill as the House of Lords renewed an assault on Rishi Sunak‘s flagship laws to ‘Stop the Boats’.

Ministers were defeated by 274 votes to 172, majority of 102, as peers backed an amendment to the legislation in the unelected chamber.

The Lords supported a move to ensure the controversial Bill is fully compliant with domestic and international law.

It is likely to be the first in a series of defeats for the Government, with a string of other amendments having been tabled to the marquee legislation by peers. 

Proposed changes due to be debated this week include delaying deportations to Rwanda until more safeguards are in place about the treatment of migrants in the African country.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and former judge Baroness Hale of Richmond are also backing efforts to prevent ministers ignoring the European Court of Human Rights via the legislation.

Although the amendments are unlikely to block the legislation altogether, with the House of Commons having the final say, many peers are determined to slow progress of the Bill.

Today’s heavy Government defeat sets the stage for an extended tussle between the Commons and Lords during ‘ping-pong’, where legislation is batted between the two Houses until agreement is reached. 

Mr Sunak has said he wants the first flights to leave for Rwanda this Spring, but Tories fear the policy will not be up and running before the general election, expected this Autumn.

Peers inflicted a huge defeat on the Government’s Rwanda Bill as the House of Lords renewed their assault on Rishi Sunak’s flagship laws to ‘Stop the Boats’

The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby (pictured) and ex-judge Baroness Hale are backing efforts to prevent ministers ignoring the European Court of Human Rights

Home Secretary James Cleverly (pictured with Rishi Sunak last month) said he was ‘absolutely determined’ to tackle illegal immigration

A group in a small boat were picked up in the Channel on Monday morning

During today’s debate in the Lords on the Rwanda Bill, former Tory leader Michael Howard said the Government was ‘fully entitled’ to use the legislation to declare Rwanda a safe country to remove asylum seekers to.

Lord Howard of Lympne told peers that the Supreme Court had been ‘trespassing’ on the Government’s responsibilities in their November ruling that Rwanda is not a safe third country.

‘All the Government is doing in this bill is to reassert its responsibility, as traditionally understood by the principle of the separation of powers, for executive decision-making,’ he told peers.

‘And there is a reason why it is the Government, and not the courts, which has that responsibility. It is because it is the Government, and not the courts, which is accountable. The courts is accountable to no one – they pride themselves on that.

‘But accountability is at the heart of democracy. That is why the Government is fully entitled to bring forward this bill and why much of the criticism which is directed at it for doing so is, for the reasons I have given, fundamentally misconceived.’

But critics of the Bill lined up to deliver fresh criticism of the legislation.

The Archbishop of Canterbury pointed out international human rights law had grown out of the horrors committed by Nazi Germany, where in 1933 a government that ‘had been legally and properly elected, passed horrific laws that did terrible things’.

He added: ‘We are not in any situation remotely like that, let’s be clear. The Government is not doing something on the scale of what we saw at that stage.

‘But the Government is challenging the right of international law to constrain our actions. And the point of international law is to stop governments going ahead with things that are wrong.’

Tory peer Lord Tugendhat, whose nephew is security minister Tom Tugendhat, accused the Government of behaving like the ruling party in George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, in its move to legislate that Rwanda was safe.

He said: ‘If this Bill goes onto the statute book in its present form, Rwanda will be a safe country regardless of reality until the statute is repealed.’

Crossbench peer Baroness D’Souza, the former Lord Speaker, branded the Bill a ‘legal fiction’ as she claimed it was an attempt at ‘writing into law a demonstrably false statement that Rwanda is a safe country to receive asylum seekers and thereby forcing all courts to treat Rwanda as a safe country, despite clear findings of fact’.

Ken Clarke, the former Tory chancellor, expressed his hope there would be a legal challenge to the Rwanda Bill, even if the legislation was passed by Parliament.

‘I can’t recall a precedent in my time where a Government of any complexion has produced a Bill which asserts facts, a matter of facts, facts to be fact,’ Lord Clarke of Nottingham told peers.

‘And then goes on to say that this should be regarded legally as a fact interminably until and unless the Bill is changed, and then goes on to say that no court should even consider any question of the facts being otherwise.

‘It’s no good blaming the Human Rights Act, I do not think it probable that the British courts were going to come to any other conclusion.

‘And if the Labour party allow this Bill to go through, I very much hope there will be a legal challenge, and the Supreme Court will consider it obviously objectively again.’

The Government has said the Rwanda Bill – and an accompanying treaty with Kigali – is key to reviving efforts to deport asylum seekers to Africa following the Supreme Court’s block on the scheme last year.

The PM hopes getting Rwanda flights up and running will then prove a deterrent to other migrants thinking of crossing the Channel to Britain in small boats.

Home Secretary James Cleverly earlier said he was ‘absolutely determined’ to tackle illegal immigration, pointing to his experience in the London Assembly more than a decade ago.

‘It was Labour’s failure in government in the early to mid-2000s leading up to that 2008 election which I think contributed to the electoral result with a member of the BNP getting voted on to the London Assembly. Labour dropped the ball. I have no intention of doing that,’ he told The Times. 

Mr Cleverly added: ‘At election time I will be very, very comfortable standing with a record reducing small boats arrivals.’ 

Mr Sunak last week insisted his Rwanda deportation scheme is a ‘worthwhile investment’ despite the public spending watchdog cautioning that costs could soar to half a billion pounds.

And Downing Street today insisted the Government remains committed to sending flights to Rwanda ‘in the Spring’.

The PM’s official spokesman said: ‘The PM is focused on delivering for the British people and stopping the boats, and he is clear that our partnership with Rwanda is one of the key levers to deliver this.

‘Our legally binding treaty makes clear that individuals relocated to Rwanda under the partnership will not be returned to an unsafe country and building on our treaty the Bill will make absolutely clear in UK law that Rwanda is a safe country and a key part of our efforts to stop the boats and save lives.

‘Through our treaty and Bill we will control our borders, deter people taking perilous journeys, reduce the strain on our public services and end the continuous legal challenges against removals.’

The spokesman added that the Government was ‘confident that Rwanda is implementing the terms of our treaty’.

In a revelation branded a ‘national scandal’ by Labour, the National Audit Office (NAO) said the Rwanda plan could cost taxpayers nearly £2million for each of the first 300 asylum seekers sent to the east African nation.

The Home Office had so far refused to say how much more money, on top of the £290million already confirmed, the UK has agreed to pay Kigali under the stalled plan.

But an NAO report uncovered millions more in spending including £11,000 for each migrant’s plane ticket.

Speaking during a visit to Scotland on Friday, Mr Sunak told reporters: ‘The current situation is unsustainable and unfair. 

‘Taxpayers are already forking out millions of pounds a day to house illegal migrants in hotels across the country, that’s not right. That’s why I made stopping the boats one of my priorities.

‘I’m pleased that we’ve made progress, last year the numbers were down by a third.’