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Peers face call to ‘calm down’ and allow Rwanda bill to clear parliamentSign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailPrime minister Rishi Sunak said flights to Rwanda have been booked and will take off by July, “no ifs, no buts” at a Downing Street news conference ahead of the Rwanda bill returning to parliament later today.Mr Sunak told the surprise conference the first flight carrying asylum seekers would leave for Rwanda in 10-12 weeks, despite the problems he has faced passing it into law. Peers have repeatedly blocked the legislation with a series of amendments, stretching debate on the “emergency legislation” over more than four months and delaying flights taking asylum seekers to Rwanda.The bill is intended to overcome the objections of the Supreme Court by forcing judges to treat Rwanda as a safe country for asylum seekers and allowing ministers to ignore emergency injunctions from the European Court of Human Rights.MPs are expected to vote to overturn those changes before sending the bill back to the House of Lords, where some peers may attempt to insist on their amendments again.Show latest update 1713797272Tory MP Sir Robert Buckland, a former government minister, explained why he was backing the Afghan amendment to the Rwanda bill, Holly Bancroft reports.Referring to members of the Afghan special forces, who fought alongside UK soldiers and who are currently having their UK relocation applications reviewed, he said: “We don’t want to end up with people, who are having their applications reviewed by the MoD, who are stuck in Pakistan, we don’t want them to end up in a position where they’re being carted off in this scheme,” he said.“It wasn’t designed for this sort of category [of people]. Despite all the progress we’ve made on bringing Afghans to safety in the UK, we don’t want to end up with unintended consequences where people who’ve risked their lives for our safety are then put into this scheme.”Sir Robert is also backing the other Lords’ amendment, which would make sure the monitoring committee verifies Rwanda as safe before asylum seekers are sent there. It was also make sure that the committee can tell MPs when Rwanda is no longer a safe country.Sir Robert said neither were “wrecking amendments” but were rather about getting the detail of the bill right.Once the Rwanda bill is passed, Sir Robert told The Independent that there will “inevitably be individual legal challenges”. However he felt that the likelihood of an intervention from the ECHR “has probably receded” due to new guidelines issued to the Strasbourg judges, which have raised the threshold for issuing injunctions. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailRwanda deportation flights will begin in July, Rishi Sunak has said as he promised to break the deadlock over the controversial immigration bill.The prime minister said the plans are in place and migrants will be sent to the east African nation in 10 to 12 weeks “come what may”.After five months of wrangling over the so-called emergency Safety of Rwanda bill, which deems it a safe country for relocating asylum seekers, Mr Sunak threw down the gauntlet to peers in the House of Lords.“Parliament will sit there tonight and vote, no matter how late it goes; no ifs, no buts, these flights are going to Rwanda,” he told a press conference ahead of the Lords showdown.It will see weeks of parliamentary back and forth finally come to a head, with peers pressuring Mr Sunak to allow amendments to the bill, but the PM standing firm.In a sign of the battle facing ministers, a leading lawyer who sits in the Lords has promised to “keep going as long as necessary” to amend the “ill judged and inappropriate” bill.Lord Carlile, the former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, told the BBC: “This is something which is ill-judged, badly drafted, inappropriate, illegal in UK and international law and the House of Lords is absolutely right to say we want to maintain our legal standards in this country.”Peers are pushing for Afghan heroes who supported UK troops overseas to be exempted from Rwanda deportation flights.And they want an independent monitoring body to verify that protections in the UK’s treaty with Rwanda are fully implemented and remain in place.A group of people thought to be migrants crossing the Channel in a small boat traveling from the coast of France and heading in the direction of Dover, Kent (PA) More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailRishi Sunak has urged peers in the House of Lords to back his Rwanda plan ahead of a final parliamentary showdown this evening. Peers have so far been insisting on two amendments to the Safety of Rwanda bill; one that would ensure that a treaty with the country is properly implemented, and another that would exempt Afghans who served alongside UK forces from deportation. Mr Sunak has insisted that parliament will sit as long as it takes to get the bill passed this evening. “No ifs, no buts, these flights are going to Rwanda,” he said at a Monday morning press conferenc . So what happens next once the flagship Rwanda plan is passed by the Lords? There will reportedly be around 150 asylum seekers on the first two or three flights to Kigali, with flights expected to start in July. “We have prepared for this moment… We’ve increased detention spaces to 2,200,” Mr Sunak announced. The prime minister said the government had put an airfield on standby and booked commercial charter planes for specific slots to remove the asylum seekers to Rwanda. He added that 500 highly trained individuals had been found to escort “migrants all the way to Rwanda” with 300 more trained in the coming weeks. The prime minister said that the first flight would leave in 10-12 weeks and he committed to regular flights over the summer “until the boats are stopped”. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaks during a press conference in Downing Street, London. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailWatch as Rishi Sunak held a press conference to urge peers to back his controversial Rwanda legislation on Monday, 22 April.The prime minister’s surprise speech came ahead of the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill’s final showdown in parliament.Mr Sunak’s legislation is aimed at making the plan to send asylum seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda legally watertight.The bill is intended to overcome the objections of the Supreme Court by forcing judges to regard Rwanda as a safe country for asylum seekers and allowing ministers to ignore emergency injunctions from the European Court of Human Rights.However, it has been subject to extensive parliamentary back-and-forth, with peers repeatedly blocking the bill with a series of amendments.The government has vowed Parliament will sit late into Monday night if necessary to pass the bill, which it sees as vital to the prime minister’s pledge to “stop the boats”. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster email Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk is celebrating after a series of candidates supported by his party won weekend races for mayor.Tusk declared victory in the second round of the country’s local elections late Sunday and listed the many cities where candidates backed by his Civic Coalition won, among them Krakow, Poznan, Wroclaw and Rzeszow.It puts the pro-European Union centrist Civic Coalition in a favorable position as the country looks next to elections to the European Parliament on June 9. “I think we won the second round. We won’t stop!” Tusk wrote on social platform X.Mayors were chosen in a total of 748 cities and towns where no single candidate won at least 50% of the vote during the first round on April 7.Candidates for Tusk’s party also recaptured cities where they had not held power for many years, including Zielona Gora, Legnica and Torun. The local and regional elections were viewed as a test for Tusk’s pro-European Union government four months after it took power at the national level. Sunday’s second round strengthened the Tusk government’s leverage in the cities, which should facilitate cooperation on development projects and allotment of EU funds. Tusk’s allies also won in some places in the first round two weeks ago, including in Warsaw where incumbent Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski was an easy victor. In the first round, the main opposition party, the right-wing Law and Justice, prevailed on the level of regional assemblies in the country’s 16 provinces, where it took 34.3% of the votes, while Tusks’ Civic Coalition got 30.6%. Law and Justice governed on the national level from 2015-23. Tusk’s socially liberal Civic Coalition traditionally has strong support in cities, while Law and Justice has a more solid base in conservative rural areas, particularly in eastern Poland.Civic Coalition is the largest group in a three-party coalition that governs Poland. The coalition is pro-European Union but otherwise spans a wide ideological spectrum with left-wing politicians in the Left party as well as conservatives in the Third Way. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailLord David Cameron has heralded a “new era” in relations between Britain and Central Asia on a visit to the region amid concerns about trade sanctions on Russia being side-stepped in neighbouring countries.The Foreign Secretary is travelling across Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia in a diplomatic bid to boost trade, security and environmental ties with the UK.He will warn Central Asia is “at the epicentre of some of the biggest challenges we face” as he announces a series of measures aimed at supporting its “hard-won sovereignty”.In a meeting with Tajik President Emomali Rahmon at the Palace of the Nation in Dushanbe on Monday, Lord Cameron said there was “more we can do” to co-operate on key areas like business, climate change and counter-terrorism.“I’m delighted to be the first foreign secretary to visit your country. I’m only sorry that it’s taken so long for one to come,” he told President Rahmon.“We want to signal a new era in relations between Britain and all of the Central Asia republics, starting here in Tajikistan.“Overall we’re here to say ‘let’s make the partnership bigger, let’s do more things together’.”( More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailWet wipes containing plastic are finally set to be banned across the UK as ministers warn a ‘step change’ is needed to protect the country’s rivers. The long-awaited announcement comes after a campaign against the products which have been blamed for hundreds of thousands of blockages in the UK sewer system costing millions of pounds a year. Manufacturers have also come under fire discarded wipes increasingly littering Britain’s beaches.Under plans to be set out by the environment secretary Steve Barclay it will become illegal to sell or supply wet wipes which contain plastic.But Labour said the move did not go far enough and called for there also to be a full ban on the manufacture of plastic wet wipes.Mr Barclay said the move would be a “step change… to protect our waterways from pollution.” But shadow environment secretary Steve Reed accused ministers of breaking their pledge. He said: “Plastic wet wipes clog up our sewers, kill wildlife and lead to sewage backing up into people’s homes.”The Conservatives have broken their promises to act and are too weak to ban them outright.”Labour also accused the Tories of a lengthy delay after the party first promised to ban wet wipes in 2018, as part of a wider crackdown on plastics.The ban follows a consultation late last year, which showed overwhelming public support for the move.A previous consultation, in 2021, also found more than 90% of people were in favour of a ban.Some businesses such as Boots, Aldi and Tesco have already moved to ban wet wipes containing plastics from their stores.Steve Ager, from Boots, said: “We are pleased to see the government now taking action as a ban on all wet wipes containing plastic will have a much bigger impact than retailers taking action alone.”We all have a collective responsibility to protect the environment and support a healthy planet.”Campaigners urged ministers to go further than bans on single items.Jane Martin, chief executive of environmental organisation City To Sea, said: “It’s a positive step forward to see the government take definitive action on banning this pollutant, but action must not end there.”The Government should now look to tackle all single-use plastic products through further bans and mandated reuse and refill targets.”Legislation is expected before MPs break up for their summer break in July. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailMayor of London Sadiq Khan has pledged to make the River Thames “swimmable” within a decade as he plans to transform the capital’s waterways.The former Labour cabinet minister branded the river a “national embarrassment” as his own analysis published this year revealed a nearly five-fold rise in the duration of sewage spills in London in 2023.Acknowledging the huge challenge facing the capital yet undeterred from his “moonshot plan”, Mr Khan told The Sunday Times: “We won’t do this overnight. It will take us a few years to do – but the great thing is there’s an appetite from Londoners and campaigners.”His announcement echoes a proposal by the Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo to reopen the Seine to swimmers to create an Olympic legacy for the city. The river is currently being cleaned so swimming events for the 2024 games later this year will be able to happen in its waters.The opening of London’s new £5 billion 16-mile “super sewer” this summer is bringing environmentalists hope the state of the Thames is set to improve. The Tideway Tunnel will join 34 storm overflow drains as well as divert sewage to an east London treatment works, consequently reducing the amount of waste being pumped into the river, according to engineers.Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has pledged to make the River Thames ‘swimmable’ within a decade as he plans to transform the capital’s waterways More