Rwanda asylum seekers: UK could send first people ‘within weeks’

The government said the first asylum seekers could be flown to Rwanda from the UK within a few weeks.

It follows the announcement of a pilot project in which people will be sent to the East African country to apply for asylum there.

This program will initially focus on single men crossing the English Channel in boats or trucks from France.

The prime minister has said he wants to break the traffickers’ business model, but the plans have been called “inhumane” by campaigners.

Speaking to BBC Newsnight, Andrew Griffith MP, director of Policy Unit Number Ten, said the program would not require new legislation and could be implemented within “existing conventions”.

“Therefore, it should be possible to implement and operationalize this in weeks or a few months,” he said. “So we’re ready to go in that sense.”

He added that if the flow of illegal migration could be stopped there would be “much capacity left for the very generous safe and legal routes” to the UK.

The Rwanda program is one of a number of measures announced as part of a broader strategy to reduce the number of people entering the UK via Channel crossings in small boats.

Last year the number reached 28,526, up from 8,404 in 2020.

Other measures include handing over responsibility for patrolling the canal to the Royal Navy and life sentences for people smugglers.

Speaking in Kent on Thursday, Boris Johnson said the deal with Rwanda would “provide safe and legal avenues of asylum while disrupting the gangs’ business model”.

“This means that economic migrants using the asylum system cannot remain in the UK, while those who really need it are given adequate protection, including access to legal assistance on arrival in Rwanda,” he said.

He also said the scheme would cover anyone who entered the UK illegally since earlier this year.

More than 160 charities and campaign groups have called on the government to scrap the plan, calling it “shamefully cruel” in an open letter.

Refugee council chief Enver Solomon called the program “cruel” and said it would do “little to deter desperate people from seeking shelter or stop the smugglers, it would only lead to more human suffering”.

Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer said the Prime Minister was trying to divert the country from the Partygate scandal with an “unworkable, unethical and blackmailing” plan.

The Lib Dems said the government was “slamming the door” on the refugees, while the SNP’s Ian Blackford called the plan “absolutely terrifying”.

Former UKIP and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage also criticized the plan, saying it was “not much more than a short-term solution”.

Questions are also raised about the cost of such systems.

A similar scheme in Australia cost that country’s government an estimated £460m in 2021, but only 239 people were successfully relocated – costing about £1.9m per person.

Mr Griffith said that “all the different options – including the current status quo of housing 25,000 asylum seekers in hotels at taxpayers’ expense – are costly”.

Concerns are being raised about the human rights record of Rwanda and the country’s President Paul Kagame.

Steve Valdez-Symonds, director of refugee and migrant rights at Amnesty International UK, said that sending people seeking asylum in the UK to another country, “let alone one with them, was the height of irresponsibility such a dismal human rights record”.

Last year, the UK government expressed concern to the United Nations about “continued restrictions on civil and political rights and media freedoms” in Rwanda.

Yolande Makolo, a Rwandan government spokesman, told the BBC it was a “safe country, it’s developing fast, we care about human rights just like any country”.

According to a memorandum of understanding between the two governments, any person seconded to Rwanda will be provided with housing and assistance and will be free to leave and leave their accommodation at any time.