FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
LONDON – Rishi Sunak’s government is taking a very tough line against illegal landings: All migrants arriving via the English Channel will no longer be able to apply for asylum, but will be detained and sent to Rwanda or other countries deemed “safe” as soon as possible deported.
It’s London’s response to an emergency that saw over 45,000 people arrive on makeshift boats on Britain’s shores in 2022: an issue that has quickly become a priority for public opinion and a thorn in the side of Conservative governments.
The government will therefore introduce a law on Tuesday March 7 that has already drawn criticism from human rights groups and which government officials admit is “on the fringes” of international legality.
Tens of thousands of people could be held in military installations, and the Home Office will be legally obliged to deport them “as soon as possible”: rules that also apply to families and even unaccompanied minors.
All illegal immigrants are also barred from returning to Britain for life and can never regain British citizenship.
On the other hand, the government has promised to open up “legal and safe” avenues for asylum seekers, although it has not specified how: “The ability to settle in this country and become a British citizen is not a human right, it is a privilege.” – said a government source -. That’s why we will ban illegal immigrants.”
And Prime Minister Sunak added that “illegal immigration is unfair to taxpayers, it is unfair to those who come here legally and it is wrong that criminal gangs are allowed to continue their immoral trade. So let’s understand each other well: if you come here illegally, you can’t stay».
But the Refugee Council countered that tens of thousands of people entitled to asylum would be “locked up as criminals” and that the government’s plan violated the UN Refugee Convention.
According to the Council, two-thirds of the migrants who landed last year were entitled to asylum: and in fact, almost all arriving from Afghanistan, Eritrea or Syria have been granted asylum.
Last year, the British government tried to deport illegal immigrants to Rwanda, with which it signed an agreement to this effect. However, the flights were blocked by short-term intervention by the European Court of Human Rights. Now Sunak wants to incorporate a “brake” on the court’s jurisdiction in the new law: And the right wing of his party is pressuring London to withdraw entirely from the European Convention on Human Rights.
The move by the British Prime Minister should be read from an electoral perspective: After the success with the agreement on Northern Ireland, Sunak wants to draw a furrow with the Labor opposition, which is still clearly at the top in the polls.
Illegal immigration has returned to the forefront of public opinion, right behind the economy and healthcare: and 87% of the public believe the government is handling the issue poorly.
Therefore, the Prime Minister has made stopping the landings one of his priorities for this year. However, the attitude of the British towards immigration is ambivalent: after Brexit, contrary to what was expected, there was a boom in arrivals from abroad, more than a million last year alone.
But these are legal immigrants, mostly students or qualified personnel, about whom public opinion is quite relaxed: instead, concerns about illegal landings are being felt, with a sense of a situation spiraling out of control. The hostility is therefore not directed at immigration, but at the lack of rules and the risk of indiscriminate immigration.