I thought it was worth sharing this critique of the Rwanda policy from a Conservative point of view.
Henry Hill, deputy editor of Conservative Home, takes a largely practical point of view, with two main related arguments: the policy won’t work on its own terms and, if it does, it won’t shift any votes anyway.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Cast your mind back to the moment the former Tory prime minister’s renegotiated deal for our EU membership “exploded on the launchpad” ahead of the referendum.
It’s a problem on a much vaster scale than illegal entry; tackling it would be much more difficult (in theory), and, as a creature of the Treasury, Sunak probably doesn’t really see anything fundamentally wrong with the current setup anyway.
Downing Street hoped to get the legislation through the courts without having to confront the serious conflict between its aspirations on border control and the UK’s present international commitments.
Sunak clearly has no personal interest in our relationship with the ECHR: rightwingers have seen in Brexit what happens when a major constitutional change is pushed forward by a reluctant prime minister who doesn’t believe in it.
Indeed, one reason I and others didn’t completely discount the idea of a May election was the reverse argument: that if the bill did get through, Sunak might prefer to go to the country before the policy’s limited impact on Channel crossings became apparent in the summer.
It’s also been suggested to me that some in Downing Street hoped, if not expected, the legislation to fail, allowing them to run an election against the blockers in the House of Lords rather than on the results of the policy itself.
The original article contains 966 words, the summary contains 221 words. Saved 77%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!