John Major, the former Conservative Prime Minister, is a good and decent man. A politician of conviction and substance. I didn’t always hold that view. But his stature has grown in my estimation over the years.
Unlike his successors he held firm against the deluded anti-Europeans in the Tory Party, that have so damaged our national interest.
As Prime Minister, he resisted the Tory Party becoming an isolationist, nativist, reactionary party that rejects the rule of law. Which it proceeded to become.
As an ex-Prime Minister, his interventions in the public discourse have been wise and well measured.
He has now criticised the previous Tory Government’s Rwanda plan as “un-Conservative and un-British”. He also said he did “not think the policy would have acted as a deterrent”.
Of Sunak and his Government he said: “Are they seriously saying to me that somewhere in the backwoods of some north African country, they actually know what the British Parliament has legislated for? I think not”.
So, in saying all this is John Major right? Broadly I think he is.
Was the Rwanda scheme un-Conservative? Well, I’m not a Conservative, but such a policy would never have immerged under Major or Thatcher.
Because those Tory regimes respected the rule of law, and pursued policies – although I very strongly disagreed with many of them – that had substance and added up. Rwanda manifestly did not. It was a populist gimmick, and knee jerk populists gimmicks have become the trade mark of the Tory Party.
Was Rwanda un British? Well a summary of British values include respect for the rule of law, respect and tolerance, and protection of your rights and the rights of others. The Rwanda scheme falls short on all of these tests.
Would the Rwanda scheme have been a deterrent? Emphatically not. Only one per cent of illegal boat crossers were ever going to go to Rwanda. If you’ve travelled half way across the world that is manifestly not a deterrent.
Why was Rwanda so flawed? I’m not against offshore processing of Asylum claims. But that is not what Rwanda was. Claimants were being sent there permanently. To a country with major human rights concerns. A country where there is repression of free speech, arbitrary detention, unlawful and arbitrary killings involving the Government, and torture is practiced by the state. You can’t unmake all of that by simply legislating Rwanda as safe.
So, John Major is right in his critique of the Rwanda Scheme.
But I don’t think he’s against tackling illegal immigration. And neither most certainly am I nor our new Labour Government. But in tackling illegal immigration we have to be straight with people. About what will work and not work. Straight about what is morally and practically acceptable. Straight about the time scales.
The new Labour Government is determined to reduce migration by speeding up processing of Asylum claims. Ending the use of hotels. Getting many more returns agreements. Smashing the criminal gangs through the Border Security Command and joint working through Europol with our neighbours. All to the good.
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But we also must learn from and mirror what’s working elsewhere. Italy has seen a 62 per cent fall in illegal migration.
I’m heartened our government is looking to work with and mirror some of the actions of the Italians. Where they have spent money supporting Tunisia and Libya to beef up their border security to stop outflow of migrants.
And it will take spending money overseas to cut illegal migration. (And it is frankly risible of politicians and newspapers who decry such spending when it is key to tackling the problem of migration).
And we should explore offshore processing of claims in a safe country like Albania, as the Italians have done. Processing, not permanent removal with Italian officials undertaking the processing.
All of that is a practical, hardheaded approach to cutting illegal immigration. A million miles from the bankrupt Rwanda scheme which John Major has rightly denounced.