Rishi Sunak prepares to battle the courts with channel migrant plan

Migrants who have illegally crossed Channel in small boats will be banned from appealing against deportation under plan by Rishi Sunak

• Prime Minister Rishi Sunak wants to deliver his anti-Channel migrant promise
• Channel migrants will be barred from taking judicial reviews against deportation

Ministers are drawing up plans to block Channel migrants from lodging legal challenges against deportation.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has already outlined how the Government intends to automatically bar migrants from claiming asylum as part of his pledge to ‘stop the boats’.

But extra measures are being drafted to strip back migrants’ ability to launch judicial reviews or appeals.

Two separate sets of proposals are being drawn up, the Times reported, which are likely to pit ministers in a major battle with the courts.

The first – and most radical – option would prevent all small boat migrants from submitting a judicial review of their exclusion from the asylum system.

Rishi Sunak has vowed to strip Channel migrants arriving in the UK on small boats of their right to take judicial review proceedings to protect them from automatic deportation

The government claims that by removing the option of remaining in the UK for migrants, making the perilous journey across the English Channel would be far less attractive 

The second proposal would only allow legal challenges to be lodged once the migrant has been removed from the UK, a process known as ‘out-of-country appeals’.

Proposals are still being finalised by Home Secretary Suella Braverman and the PM, but are likely to be included in a landmark package of measures – possibly later this month.

CLICK TO READ MORE: Could Whitehall block radical migrant plan? 

 

A government source said: ‘The Prime Minister and Home Secretary are working flat out to bring forward the legislation as soon as possible and ensure that it is legally watertight.’

So-called ‘out-of-country’ appeals, also known as ‘non-suspensive’ appeals, have been widely used in the asylum system for more than 25 years.

In 1996 legislation set out how asylum applicants from ‘safe third countries’ could only appeal from abroad against the Home Office’s decision to refuse their case.

A wide expansion of the same principle is likely to be opposed by the House of Lords, judges and the human rights industry because it would cover all nationalities who arrive by small boat, even if their home nation is not considered ‘safe’.

The Government’s Rwanda asylum scheme – if eventually ruled lawful by senior judges later this year – could play a role in the jigsaw of new measures.

For example, Channel arrivals who come from unsafe countries could be sent to Rwanda, and lodge appeals from there.

Yesterday, the Mail reported how Mr Sunak said the new legislation would ensure those who came here illegal ‘will not be able to stay’ and the ‘vast majority’ who cross the Channel will be deported.

Previously he vowed the Government will ‘stop the boats’ as one of its five key pledges to voters, after last year saw a record 45,756 arrivals from northern France.

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘The unacceptable number of people risking their lives by making these dangerous crossings is placing an unprecedented strain on our asylum system’

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘The unacceptable number of people risking their lives by making these dangerous crossings is placing an unprecedented strain on our asylum system.

‘Our priority is to stop this and prevent these illegal crossings, and our new Small Boats Operational Command – bolstered by hundreds of extra staff – is working hard to disrupt the business model of people smugglers.

‘We are also going further by introducing legislation which will ensure that those people arriving in the UK illegally are detained and promptly removed either to their home country or a safe third country.’

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