The Independent View

Costly, inhumane, unlawful… now the Rwanda plan is also proving to be counterproductive

Editorial: The Home Office’s inability to locate thousands of migrants earmarked for its Rwanda deportation scheme shows that the only ‘deterrent’ is to asylum seekers being caught by the authorities. Rather, it will act as an incentive – only adding to the number of dangerous Channel crossings

Tuesday 30 April 2024 20:18 BST
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Migrants arriving in Dungeness, Kent, on a small boat from France in 2021
Migrants arriving in Dungeness, Kent, on a small boat from France in 2021 (PA)

Common sense suggests that if someone receives a notification that something exceedingly grim is about to befall them, the rational course is to take evasive action.

Refugees facing the threat of deportation to Rwanda are no different to anyone else and, with a heightened sense of personal safety, have reportedly been evading the Home Office’s attempts to locate them. More than half of those people designated for forced removal cannot be found – which must come as a surprise to no one.

In a rare sign of progress for the tragically misconceived Rwanda plan, the east African nation – guaranteed safe by Conservative members of parliament with little direct knowledge of the place – has agreed to take some 5,700 asylum seekers. That is but a tiny fraction of the total, and the cost of sending them over will cost tens of millions in addition to the £290m already confirmed; but, still, it suggested that things were happening.

Unfortunately, the official impact assessment points out only “2,143 continue to report to the Home Office and can be located for detention”. Quelle surprise.

It was always a predictable outcome of the Rwanda plan that, to the limited extent to which it might prove to be the “deterrent” promised, it has proved to be an extremely perverse one. Those who did feel threatened, and especially if they’d been approached by the authorities, seem to have either absconded to Ireland, or disappeared, likely never to be seen again by Border Force.

The problem is that the deterrent doesn’t deter people from coming to the UK or staying here – but it does deter them from giving themselves up to Border Force or the police to make an asylum claim, no matter how ill-starred it may be, because to follow that procedure may indeed risk deportation.

Instead, the “deterrent” is to declaring oneself an asylum seeker and to getting caught by the authorities. The “deterrent” thus acts as an incentive to entirely clandestine crossings of the English Channel, probably under cover of darkness and landing quietly in some quiet cove in the southernmost counties of England.

From there, these people, and particularly those who are economic migrants, will drift into the twilight world of the “informal” economy, characterised by criminality, forced labour and slum accommodation. These people will be denied rights, medical assistance, and their children will remain uneducated. It is the worst possible way to make them productive members of society. We will never know how many they are, let alone their identities, until they arrive in the criminal justice system.

Far from “breaking the business model” of the people traffickers, the Rwanda plan may end up extending it as many more asylum seekers live in the UK as virtual slaves. The limited extent of modern slavery that currently exists would be massively expanded. The law of unintended consequences has rarely operated with this scale of potential societal harm.

Of course, for many, the Rwanda plan is a minor threat, if that. If those fleeing torture and threat of death are willing to put their lives on the line by taking a leaky dinghy to England, then they aren’t going to be put off by the mathematically minuscule chances of deportation. By the end of the year, according to the Refugee Council, perhaps 120,000 people could be stranded in the UK without the right to claim asylum. Of them, only a few hundred will be liable to an attempt at deportation, and even those ones can be stymied by what is still a breach of the European Convention on Human Rights, and a UK Supreme Court finding of fact that Rwanda is not yet a safe destination.

Such arguments, of course, also leave aside any thought that these people could make a useful contribution to the economy and the nation as responsible citizens. We have a chronic shortage of labour, not least in our public services; and people of working age desperate to get paid work. Common sense also suggests we could solve two problems in one here; but common sense, though often cited on the right, isn’t always acted upon.

The Rwanda plan was always inhumane and unlawful under international treaty obligations, as well as outrageously costly and impractical. Now, it would seem, it will also prove counterproductive.

Quite why the prime minister, who opposed it as chancellor and as a leadership contender, has decided to tie his fortunes to a stunt dreamt up by Boris Johnson and Priti Patel is one of the greatest political mysteries of our times. Even if planes take off for Kigali with a token number of terrified refugees on board, there is no evidence that the symbolism will be so powerful as to reverse the Labour lead. Not even those most hostile to all kinds of migration are convinced by the bizarre scheme, and quite a large portion of the electorate views it with a mix of disgust and disbelief.

It is bad economics, bad politics, and a bad thing to do to desperate people. No good will come of it – not even for Rishi Sunak.

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