Labour headache if Rwanda plan works

“We’ll stop the boats, Labour will stop the flights” looks set to be Rishi Sunak’s election slogan if he can confound his critics and save the Rwanda deportation deal from near extinction.

That much was clear when Mr Sunak used a surprise Downing Street press conference yesterday (p.6) to say that the scheme would be properly up and running with multiple flights a month before a likely autumn election, rather than just a token “proof of concept” departure before a snap poll.

In doing so, the Prime Minister appears to have come to the conclusion that voters’ scepticism about the benefits and costs of the policy means he needs to get it working at such a scale that it actually achieves the aim of deterring Channel crossings and bringing the numbers down.

It is a big gamble.

Tory rebels continue to believe his Safety of Rwanda Bill is not tough enough to deliver more than a few token flights, and as i reveals today have set Mr Sunak a target of hitting the Home Office’s best-case scenario of 2,000 deportees in six months (or on track to meet this) for the policy to be effective.

Those who work in immigration enforcement believe this is possible but it would be a big stretch, with weekly flights operating at capacity.

No one, including the Home Office, really knows when the scheme will become a deterrent but, given that 30,000 people arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel in small boats last year, 2,000 in six months may be in the right ballpark.

Whatever the numbers sent to the east African nation, if Mr Sunak can prove a deterrent effect it will create a major headache for Labour, which continues to vow to scrap the scheme if it wins power.

But it remains a big if.