Rwanda rebel MPS line up for battle

Braverman and Jenrick head more than 30 Tories in drive to toughen up flagship deportation Bill

RISHI SUNAK faces a revolt by more than 30 Tory MPS over his Rwanda Bill as rebels yesterday tabled amendments to toughen up the legislation.

At least nine former Cabinet ministers, including former Home Office ministers Suella Braverman and Robert Jenrick, are backing four amendments that aim to prevent virtually all legal challenges by migrants against deportations to Rwanda and deny Strasbourg’s judges the ability to halt the flights.

Their actions set up a showdown next week between the Right-wing MPS and the Prime Minister when the Bill returns to the Commons on Tuesday and Wednesday for its scrutiny during its Commons committee stage.

Mr Sunak has a 56-seat majority so 30 rebels would be sufficient to defeat him, although the crunch vote will not come until the final stages of the Bill when it will be clear if the Government has granted any concessions.

The rebels backed off voting against the Bill on its second reading before Christmas. More than 20 Tories abstained but threatened to vote against it if there were no changes. They claim to have since garnered more supporters, including former cabinet ministers Sir Iain Duncan Smith, Sir Jacob Reesmogg

and Sir John Redwood. Mr Sunak’s room for manoeuvre has been limited by warnings from the centre Left One Nation group of 106 MPS that they could vote against the Bill if he goes “an inch” further in denying individual migrants’ rights to appeal and sidelining international treaties.

On Monday Mr Sunak said he was open to “bright ideas” to improve the Bill but has previously warned that if the Government goes any further in disregarding human rights laws, Rwanda would abandon the deal. The amendments were tabled last night by Mr Jenrick, who quit as immigration minister over the Bill, and the Brexit campaigner Sir Bill Cash, who was involved in talks with No 10 yesterday to try to resolve the stand-off.

Mr Jenrick said: “The Bill, as drafted, simply will not work because it doesn’t end the merry-go-round of legal challenges that frustrate removals. I’ve seen the legal advice and operational plans where this was painfully apparent.

“That’s why myself and colleagues have tabled a set of amendments that block small boat arrivals making individual claims and prevent Rule 39 pyjama injunctions from Strasbourg [from] grounding planes.

“If the Government truly wants to stop the boats, it should adopt these amendments and use Parliament’s power to deliver on the … promises we have made to the public,” he added.

“If we don’t fix this Bill the country will be consigned to more illegal crossings, more farcical migrant hotels and billions more of wasted taxpayers’ money in the years to come.”

The amendments would block legal claims by individual migrants except in a narrow set of cases, such as if a they are medically unfit, including pregnancy, or being under 18. At present, the Bill blocks systemic legal challenges but allows individual claims if deportation risks “serious and irreparable” harm.

The changes would also allow ministers to ignore rule 39 injunctions from the European Court of Human Rights, one of which blocked the first deportation flight to Rwanda in June 2022.

‘If we don’t fix this Bill, the country will be consigned to billions of wasted taxpayers’ money for years’