My Lords, I will expand on the matter in the correspondence to which I referred the noble Lord.
I will go into more detail about the work that has been and is being conducted between Rwandan and British officials. Officials from the UK and Rwanda have worked closely together to strengthen Rwanda’s asylum system. We have already developed and commenced operational training for Rwandan asylum decision-makers and strengthened procedural oversight of the MEDP and asylum processes.
In November 2023, technical experts from the Home Office, working with the Institute of Legal Practice and Development, delivered a training course aimed at asylum decision-makers in Rwanda. It focused on applying refugee law in asylum interviews and decision-making, and on best practice in assessing credibility and utilising country-of-origin information.
Furthermore, as set out in paragraph 14.1.15 of the published country information note on Rwanda’s asylum system, once the treaty is ratified there are provisions for Rwanda to move to a case-worker model when deciding asylum claims. Under that model, for the first six months Rwanda’s decision-making body will consider advice from a seconded independent expert prior to making any decision in relation to a claim.