UK Parliament / Open data

Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

I appreciate the tone and manner in which the Minister is approaching this difficult issue, but can he help on one matter? I understand his point that some amendments might have the effect of delaying the Bill, or might give rise to challenges and delay the policy objective, but I am troubled about why that should be thought to apply to Lords amendment 3E, proposed by Lord Hope of Craighead, who is a distinguished jurist and whose amendment is proposed in moderate and unpartisan terms. The rub of what will happen going forward is whether or not Rwanda is safe. Parliament can legislate, as a matter of sovereignty, to say that it is safe, but for the legislation to be effective we have to deal with the fact that we have chosen to make ourselves judges of fact, but facts may change. Given that we have put in place the mechanism, with the monitoring committee

and enhanced arrangements, which are all to the Government’s credit, I struggle to see what is in the Hope amendment that undermines the operationality of the Bill, rather than helping it. If facts did change, would it not be helpful to have such a mechanism to enable us to review that, on an informed basis?

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
748 c342 
Session
2023-24
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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