Rishi Sunak sparked outrage as he set out a hardline plan to tackle immigration if he becomes prime minister. The package includes capping the annual number of refugees and halting aid to some of the world’s poorest countries if they refuse to take back failed asylum seekers.
The former chancellor, who is trailing Liz Truss in polls among Conservative Party members in the current leadership election, said he would step up a controversial plan to operate deportation flights to Rwanda and would seek to set up similar schemes with other countries.
And he said he would ban anyone arriving by small boat across the Channel from staying in the UK – despite the fact that the majority of unauthorized arrivals are currently granted asylum status.
His plans were called “cruel” by the charity Oxfam, whose head of government relations Sam Nadel said: “If nothing else, it shows that the heat of the campaign leads to bad policy. If the former chancellor wins this race, he will be more than a party leader, he will be prime minister and world leader.
“To meet a world in desperate crisis – facing climate change, hunger and conflict – with cruel policies like these would not do justice to the role. We need more help and safe and legal routes to the UK.’
Mr Sunak, who admits he is the underdog in the race to succeed Boris Johnson, announced on Saturday that illegal immigration was one of five national emergencies that would require him to put the UK on “crisis footing” as soon as took the post.
His “10-point plan to stop illegal immigration” is significantly tougher than the measures contained in the Nationality and Borders Act, which was signed into law by Priti Patel earlier this year.
It will set him on a collision course with the European Court of Human Rights by narrowing the definition of who qualifies for asylum in the UK, as well as giving authorities extra powers to mark, detain and monitor arrivals.
And it will put it at odds with charities by explicitly linking humanitarian support to cooperation on immigration – something Christian Aid described as “beyond the pale”.
Countries that fail to take back nationals who have committed crimes or are denied the right to remain in the UK – as currently understood to be Eritrea, Iraq and Sudan – will be denied access to British aid and subject to retaliation trade and visa measures.
Mr Sunak – whose own grandparents arrived in the UK from India as legal migrants – will introduce a cap, set annually by Parliament, on the number of refugees to be admitted via “safe and legal routes”, while ensuring , that others will be removed from the country.
Effectively closing off the path to remaining in Britain for those entering the country through unauthorized routes, his plan states: “The only route to asylum in the UK will be a safe and legal route.”
A military-led small boat task force, backed by investment in surveillance technology, will be given the resources and powers needed to “end small boat beach landings” and monitor the apprehension and removal of those crossing the Channel by boat .
Adapted cruise ships will be used as floating detention camps for migrants believed to have arrived in the UK illegally, in a bid to curb the £5m-a-day cost of putting them up in hotels.
Mr Sunak will request an urgent meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron in a bid to “seek accountability from the French”, with clear targets to stop boats and “no options off the table”.
He vowed to do “whatever is necessary” to implement and extend the deal with Rwanda, under which the African country is paid to take in asylum seekers without their claims ever being dealt with in the UK. And he said he would pursue similar arrangements with other countries.
Meanwhile, penalties for businesses using illegal migrant labor will be tougher and Mr Sunak will aim to clear 80 per cent of asylum applications within six months to reduce the current backlog of more than 100,000 applications , awaiting an initial decision.
Mr Sunak, who backed Brexit, said his “sensible, fair and proportionate” package would allow him to deliver on the Leave campaign promise to “take back control of our borders”.
“The system is currently chaotic, with law-abiding citizens seeing boats full of illegal immigrants coming from the safe side of France, with our sailors and coast guard seemingly powerless to stop them,” he said. “It has to stop and if I’m prime minister I will stop it.
But Refugee Council chief executive Enver Solomon called on both candidates in the Tory leadership race to “take a new direction” and ditch the Rwanda scheme in favor of safe routes and humanitarian visas.
“Whoever becomes our next prime minister must replace our broken asylum system with one that is fair, humane and orderly,” Mr Solomon said.
“This is an opportunity to commit to increasing safe routes, such as family reunification and humanitarian visas, so that those at risk of violence and persecution do not have to make dangerous journeys to find safety here.” We call on our next Prime Minister to take a new direction and abandon the brutal scheme with Rwanda.
Pete Murry, head of UK campaigns and advocacy at Christian Aid, condemned the suggested link between migration and aid.
“At a time when conflict and the climate crisis are pushing more people into poverty in East Africa and many other parts of the world, any proposal that further shrinks our financial support is beyond the pale,” he said. “The UK has a historic and moral responsibility to end extreme poverty. We must lead the world in addressing the interconnected global crises of hunger, climate and conflict. This is what leadership looks like.”
Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “Rishi Sunak as Chancellor of the Exchequer and Liz Truss as Foreign Secretary signed off on the Rwanda deal – a £120m write-off of taxpayers’ money under a broken scheme which the Government admitted was unworkable with a very high risk of fraud.
“They are responsible for wasting taxpayers’ money and have served in a cabinet that has failed at all to stop organized crime or fix the asylum system.
“The Conservatives have been in power for 12 years. It’s unbelievable that they claim to be the ones to fix things after they’ve both failed for so long.”
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Alistair Carmichael said Mr Sunak should never be forgiven for signing off on “ridiculous sums” of taxpayers’ money under the Rwandan scheme, which has so far failed to result in any deportations and for which the government in Kigali now it says it only has the capacity for 200 people.
“These are people who should have been treated with the decency and respect they deserve, but Rishi Sunak wasted the public’s money to send them away,” Mr Carmichael said. “It does not represent Britain’s long and proud history of helping those fleeing war and persecution.”
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