WOULD we ever have thought that the UK’s Rwanda Bill could have had such unforeseen consequences for ourselves? Bad enough to have the Tory press chortling at the quagmire in which we find ourselves, but worse, nobody has the slightest idea how this latest immigrant crisis will play out.
The blaze was started when it was revealed that, since January, the great majority of those applying for refugee status here had arrived via a journey across the border from the North. These asylum seekers, who had first made their way to Britain, were panicked into action with the realisation that before long, they would find themselves transported to Rwanda in Africa.
News quickly spread on the grapevine, and the illegal immigrants, mostly Nigerian – many of whom had risked their lives crossing the Channel in rubber boats – packed bag and baggage and headed for Ireland. Here they would be safe, not least because of the High Court ruling that it would be in breach of EU law if any attempt were made by Dublin to deport them back to the UK, a decision which, as we now learn, brought its own unintended results.
Briefly, to recap. The Rwanda Asylum Plan is a five year agreement between the UK and that African country under which the British authorities will round up and detain all its illegal immigrants before deporting them to Rwanda. (Michael O’Leary, to much publicity, has helpfully offered to place the Ryanair flight on standby to carry out the required deportations).
Britain has agreed to pay a lump sum of £120 million, together with a substantial per capita bounty, to Rwanda, where the immigrants will have their asylum applications processed. Those who are approved will be entitled to resettle and spend their lives in Rwanda; those who are refused will be banished to wherever they first came from.
In either event, the red line as far as the UK is concerned, is that none of the immigrants will ever set foot on British soil again.
So back to Judge Phelan’s ruling that, because Britain is no longer a safe country for asylum seekers, it would be a breach of EU law if we try to send back the new arrivals. Good news for the immigrants then, and good news too for Britain, as the Tory media gleefully reminds us. The Dublin response has been to introduce amending legislation which would – regardless of what the High Court thinks – redesignate the UK as a safe country for asylum seekers.
If this begins to sound like a bonanza for lawyers, be assured it will be. How, for example, can a certain course of action be a breach of EU law and, then, a week later, with a wave of the wand, be the opposite? And even more urgently, what if the UK continues to maintain that it has not the slightest intention of taking back the asylum seekers who have turned up in Dublin?
Across the water, the Tory media is jovially milking the imbroglio for all it’s worth. Karma has finally caught up with the Irish, the taunts go; the Irish were adamant that there be no hard border on the island, but now see where that has led them; the old caveat about being careful what you wish for has had repeated outings. The arch Tory, the pompous Jacob Rees-Mogg, has suggested that as an alternative to the Rwanda strategy, Britain should simply bus its illegal immigrants across the Irish sea to vacated army buildings in Newry from where, should they so wish, they could cross the porous land border.
All of that, we could live with. Of more serious import is that the Irish Government finds itself between a rock and a hard place for which it is signally ill prepared.
OPINION: Rwanda, and being careful what you wish for
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10.05.2024
WOULD we ever have thought that the UK’s Rwanda Bill could have had such unforeseen consequences for ourselves? Bad enough to have the Tory press chortling at the quagmire in which we find ourselves, but worse, nobody has the slightest idea how this latest immigrant crisis will play out.
The blaze was started when it was revealed that, since January, the great majority of those applying for refugee status here had arrived via a journey across the border from the North. These asylum seekers, who had first made their way to Britain, were panicked into action with the realisation that before long, they would find themselves transported to Rwanda in Africa.
News quickly spread on the grapevine, and the illegal immigrants, mostly Nigerian – many of whom had risked their lives crossing the Channel in rubber boats – packed bag and baggage and headed for Ireland. Here they would be........
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