UK Supreme Court Declares Government’s Key Rwanda Policy Unlawful
The UK Supreme Court has thrown out the government’s flagship policy of sending illegal immigrants to Rwanda to await processing of their asylum applications. The UK Supreme Court has ruled the government’s controversial Rwanda policy is unlawful only hours after outgoing Home Secretary Suella Braverman said there was “no credible Plan B.” The Home Office wanted to transport asylum seekers to the Rwandan capital, Kigali if they arrived in Britain illegally, and it was quite clear the policy was designed to deter those who crossed the English Channel in small boats. After the ruling, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said it was, “not the outcome we wanted” but he said he remained, “completely committed to stopping the boats.”
The policy would also have put Rwanda in charge of processing asylum applications to the UK. But Wednesday’s ruling by Lord Reed, president of the Supreme Court, Lord Hodge, Lord Lloyd-Jones, Lord Briggs and Lord Sales said there was a risk that genuine asylum seekers would be sent back to the country from where they had fled by Rwanda. Last month, the Home Office challenged a Court of Appeal ruling from June which overturned the High Court’s finding that Rwanda could be considered a “safe third country” for illegal immigrants.
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Lawyers representing people facing deportation to the African nation had argued Rwanda was an, “authoritarian, one-party state” with a “woefully deficient” asylum system. The five Supreme Court judges unanimously agreed with the Court of Appeal ruling that the policy was unlawful in its present state. ‘Real Risk’ of Asylum Seekers Facing ‘Ill Treatment’
Lord Reed said the “legal test” was whether there were “substantial grounds” for believing asylum seekers sent to Rwanda would be at “real risk” of being sent back to the countries they came from where they originated and where they might face “ill treatment.” He said: “In the light of the evidence which I have summarized, the Court of Appeal concluded that there were such grounds. We are unanimous of the view that they were entitled to reach that conclusion. Indeed, having been taken through the evidence ourselves, we agree with their conclusion.”
