Rishi Sunak is the latest Tory prime minister to make a crackdown on small boats crossing the Channel one of their priorities. But his government has admitted that his plan will “push the boundaries of international law”, and critics have branded it “unworkable” and “costly”.
Refugees who arrive in the UK by small boat from today will be banned from claiming asylum or using human rights law to stop their removal.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman is set to publish long-promised legislation on Channel crossings on Tuesday that she has admitted “pushes the boundaries of international law”.
This will include preventing people who come to the UK illegally from claiming asylum.
Ms Braverman will ask for this to apply from the moment she unveils the proposals in the Commons to avoid people smugglers “seizing on the opportunity to rush migrants across the Channel”, a government source told Sky News.
She is expected to say that under the new illegal migration bill, asylum claims from those who travel to the UK in small boats will be inadmissible.
Arrivals will be removed to a third country and banned from ever returning or claiming citizenship.
Refugee charities have already described the plans as “costly and unworkable” and said they “promise nothing but more demonisation and punishment” of asylum seekers.
Writing in The Sun, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said the UK has a “proud history of welcoming those most in need”.
But he claimed that those arriving in small boats were doing so via “safe, European countries”, and were not “directly fleeing a war-torn country” or “facing an imminent threat to life”.
Government ‘pushing boundaries of international law’
Critics say the UK has “comprehensively shut down” legal routes for refugees to come to the UK.
While there are schemes to help people fleeing specific countries like Hong Kong and Ukraine, the government has failed to explain the safe and legal routes for asylum seekers escaping war from other parts of the world.
Mr Sunak has made stopping Channel migrant crossings one of his five priorities in office and said while previous bills have made a start on gripping this, “what we are announcing today takes that work forward”.
“It will mean that those who come here on small boats can’t claim asylum here,” he added.
Despite plans such as forcibly removing asylum seekers to Rwanda being mired in legal challenges, ministers were expected to approach the limits of the European Convention on Human Rights with the new legislation.
Writing in the Daily Express, Ms Braverman admitted the plan “pushed the boundaries of international law”.