UK: Sunak government admits doubts about legality of new immigration policy | international

Rishi Sunak’s government is keen to see how far it can push the boundaries of international human rights law to advance its new immigration policy. Home Secretary Soella Braverman has sent a letter to Conservative MPs explaining…

Rishi Sunak’s government is keen to see how far it can push the boundaries of international human rights law to advance its new immigration policy. Home Secretary Soella Braverman has sent a letter to Conservative MPs explaining reasons for promoting the new law, which would veto asylum for those arriving by boat on the UK coast.

Braverman invoked Article 19 of the Human Rights Act 1998, the text the UK agreed to in order for its judges and courts to comply with the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights, to which it is a party. This Section 19 obliges the Minister responsible for a new bill, in the event that it is not clear that it is in conformity with the Convention, to formally acknowledge that suspicion if he wants to continue the process. It is the way to transfer all responsibility to the government and avoid it to Parliament.

“Our approach is robust and innovative, which is why I offered the formal admission [a la que estaría obligada]. This does not mean that the provisions of the new law are inconsistent with the rights of the Convention, just that there is a slightly over 50% chance that it is not,” Braverman acknowledges in his letter. “We are testing the limits, but we are confident that the new text is compatible with international law.”

I mean, it may be legal…or it may not be. It is evidence of the flexibility with which Anglo-Saxon common law deals with these matters, but also evidence of Downing Street’s willingness to put the UK’s international credibility to the test in exchange for pleasing the ears of the most extreme Conservative MPs.

It gives the impression, many of Sunak’s critics suspect, that the prime minister wants to be forgiven for the excess of diplomacy and white gloves on display last week with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to push a new agreement on Northern Ireland and its suitability for Brexit. European Union. One of lime and the other of sand. The new plan against irregular immigration (which the British government insists on calling “illegal immigration”, contrary to the recommendations of the United Nations) attacks the two black beasts Conservatives From the solid wing of the party: Immigration and the European Court of Human Rights.

“In the last two years we have seen a 500% increase in small boat arrivals [que cruzan el canal de la Mancha]. This is the main point to which this law responds. We will not be able to stop these arrivals until the whole world knows that if you enter the UK illegally, you will be detained and deported immediately to your country of origin or to a safe third country like Rwanda.” The new illegal immigration It was the European Court of Human Rights, based in Strasbourg, that paralyzed the first attempt to deport migrants to Rwanda in June last year, after the agreement reached between London and Kigali to send the detainees there and process their asylum requests from that country. The start of talks with Strasbourg to avoid new such interventions, which it described as “flawed” and “opaque”.

New, more stringent measures

Braverman confirmed in Parliament the new measures enshrined in the Act, which represented a draconian effort to stop small boats from reaching the coasts of southern England. If there were 299 immigrants intercepted in 2018, according to UK Home Office figures, in 2022 the number has risen to 46,000. This is the news of a project whose script has not yet been published:

The head of the Home Office is legally bound to “remove all persons who have entered the UK illegally”. They will be returned to their country of origin or to a “safe third country”. In other words, the possibility of starting asylum procedures for those who enter the country irregularly is prohibited. Only minors, those who are unable to travel because of their health condition, or those who “run serious and irreparable harm” will be able to delay their deportation.

– The government may keep intercepted offenders for up to 28 days, without the need for judicial authorization or giving them the opportunity to seek bail from a judge. However, the right to Issuing a subpoenaie the right to appear physically before a judge to decide on the legality of the detention. The Home Office will have that four-week period to proceed with almost no impediments to deportation.

– Downing Street claims retroactive law. In other words, while it is waiting for all parliamentary procedures to be completed and put into effect, in a few months, it will start counting its implementation starting from this very Tuesday. The Sinak government wants to enhance the deterrent effect of the ruling.

– The possibility of settlement at all costs will be denied to persons entering the UK irregularly and being intercepted. Unlike the current legislation so far, which imposes a penalty of between five and ten years, with the new draft, returning to British soil will be a life ban.

Each year Parliament will approve the maximum number of people who will be able to enter the UK legally, through the “safe routes” that the government has promised (and has not yet done) to design.

wave of criticism

The Labor opposition, aware that irregular immigration is a swampy electoral terrain, has centered its criticism of the project on the impossibility of putting it into practice, its inefficiency, its prohibitive cost and the fact that it promised the Tories a solution to the problem. problem. We know that they will devote themselves, for the whole of the next year, to blaming others for the fact that the plan did not work out. Stop. We cannot afford more slogans than solutions. “

Other left-wing MPs, eager to intervene in the debate, criticized the law more harshly. John McDonnell student, who was Number two From the previous era Labor Party led by Jeremy Corbyn. Braverman had just deceived the Conservative MPs by promising the immediate expulsion from the country of all “foreign criminals”.

On Tuesday, while Braverman explained the new law to MPs, Sunak visited port facilities in the city of Dover, where migrants who arrive by boat on Britain’s coast and are intercepted by the coast guard are collected and distributed. The prime minister will get there by helicopter, meet the officers in charge of the operation and use this scenario to personally defend the project with which he intends to fulfill the most relevant promise he made at the beginning of his term, at the end of last year. The year: putting an end to the skiffing phenomenon, already known in the European Union, but the novelty of those skiffs in the United Kingdom has adapted and changed the political debate.

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