The British Secretary of State for Immigration, Robert Jenrick, resigned from his position on Wednesday over his disagreements with the Government’s plan to deport asylum seekers who enter the United Kingdom illegally to Rwanda.
“I cannot continue in my position when I have such a strong disagreement with the direction of the Government’s immigration policy,” Jenrick said in a letter addressed to the Prime Minister, the conservative Rishi Sunak, which he spread on his social networks.
The resignation occurred on the same day that the Executive had presented a new law that would enable it to bypass human rights legislation, both national and international, to ensure that the courts do not stop flights to Rwanda.
The until now Secretary of State, a member of the hard wing of the Conservatives, had previously advocated removing the United Kingdom from the European Convention on Human Rights, perceived as an impediment to the Rwanda plan, and now returns to demand stronger measures in his resignation letter.
“The Government has the responsibility to place our vital national interests above highly contested interpretations of international law,” the letter emphasizes.
In his opinion, the bill introduced today “is a triumph of hope over experience” and the challenges facing the United Kingdom are “too great not to seek the strong protections required to end the carousel of demands that run the risk of paralyzing the plan.
Jenrick’s resignation also has an important internal reading on the battle for the leadership of the ‘Tories’: it comes hours after the former Minister of the Interior and standard bearer of the radical wing, Suella Braverman, criticized in Parliament the law promoted by his successor, Cleverly.
In the opinion of analysts, Braverman is trying to position himself at the head of the right-wing faction for an eventual duel for the conservative leadership with Sunak.
The prime minister himself set this year ending the arrival of undocumented immigrants in boats as one of his government’s five major commitments.
To this end, the Minister of the Interior signed this Tuesday in Rwanda with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Vincent Biruta, a new treaty to transfer migrants who enter British territory illegally to the African country, after the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom -the highest judicial body in the country- considered it illegal last November.
