By Lucy Adautin
UK’s interior minister has stood by a Parliamentary aide who criticized the government’s plan to deport illegal immigrants to Rwanda as “crap,” according to a leaked audio revealed on Sunday.
After months of parliamentary debate, the Conservative government passed a controversial law in April allowing the deportation of irregular migrants arriving in the UK to Rwanda.
In the recording, James Sunderland, a Parliamentary aide and Conservative party candidate, was heard saying, “the policy is crap, ok? It’s crap.”
“But it’s not about the policy. It’s about the effect of the policy,” Sunderland continued, speaking at a Youth Conservatives conference in April.
“There is no doubt at all that when those first flights take off, it will send such a shockwave across the channel,” Sunderland clarified.
Home Secretary James Cleverly expressed his surprise when asked about the audio, stating that Sunderland was making a “counterintuitive statement to grab attention’.
Cleverly told Sky News on Sunday that his aide, Sunderland, “is completely supportive of the deterrent effect.”
Sunderland expressed disappointment at being recorded at a private event, saying the policy is “not the be-all and end-all but part of a wider response”.
No flight deporting asylum seekers have taken off yet for the African country, due to prolonged legal challenges and with Parliament dissolved ahead of a general election on July 4.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has stated that the policy will only be implemented after the election if he is re-elected.
The opposition Labour Party, which seems set to replace the Conservatives, has promised to scrap the Rwanda plan.
The government passed a law in April allowing some asylum seekers to be deported, circumventing a Supreme Court ruling that deemed sending migrants to Rwanda illegal as it “would expose them to a real risk of ill-treatment.”
Supporters of the Rwanda policy argue it will deter the tens of thousands of annual cross-channel arrivals by small boat and insist the policy is already having an impact.
According to government data, more than 12,000 irregular migrants have crossed the channel to Britain on small boats this year.
