How red flags were brushed aside to push through Rwanda deal

Documents disclosed to high court case show repeated warnings about asylum processing plan

Until the then home secretary Priti Patel and Rwanda’s foreign minister, Vincent Biruta, sat together at a table in Kigali on 14 April and signed a deal to send asylum seekers to the east African country, few thought the agreement would actually happen.

Rumours had swirled for months about the controversial plans but nothing had come of previous Home Office ideas, both confirmed and unconfirmed, to halt the growing number of asylum seekers arriving in the UK on small boats, including wave machines in the Channel and a policy to turn around dinghies.

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Nadine Dorries joins Patel in quitting cabinet after Truss named next PM

Culture secretary offered chance to stay in role but reportedly said, ‘Now is the right time to leave cabinet’

Nadine Dorries has joined Priti Patel in quitting the cabinet hours after Liz Truss won the Conservative leadership contest.

The culture secretary was offered the chance to stay in the role, according to the Mail Plus, who first reported the story. The website quoted a friend as saying: “[Dorries] has decided now is the right time to leave cabinet.”

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Tory leadership: Nadine Dorries steps down and returns to backbenches – as it happened

Latest updates: culture secretary will not serve in Truss’s cabinet and is expected to receive peerage from Boris Johnson

Philip Hammond, who was chancellor when Theresa May was prime minister, has joined Rupert Harrison, another Tory Treasury alumnus (see 10.02am), in criticising the Truss camp this morning for disparaging Treasury orthodoxy. Hammond told Times Radio:

When I hear people talking about Treasury orthodoxy, I do worry that what they might sometimes be talking about are economic facts of life. And yes, the Treasury will ensure that politicians, however senior, are confronted with the realities of the economic facts of life. “Yes, Minister, you may wish to do this. But you need to understand that the consequences will be as follows.” And we can’t legislate to change the laws of economics, unfortunately. And I think Liz Truss understands that very well.

Obviously, I worked very closely with her. She was chief secretary to the Treasury when I was chancellor, she understands the laws of economics as well as anybody does. And it’s essential that the political solutions that a government crafts, go with the grain of the laws of economics, because if you try and confront the laws of economics, you will come unstuck.

I think it is right and unavoidable that the government needs to provide support to people dealing with these huge energy bills as a short term solution, but we have to be clear, and I think [Truss] will be clear, that this can only be government support to deal with the immediate emergency energy prices being sky high, largely because of the war in Ukraine.

At the same time we’ve got to be honest about the fact that energy bills in the future are going to be higher than they were, traditionally, as we move to ensure energy self sufficiency, and to decarbonise our economies. That has always been the case; decarbonisation doesn’t come free.

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UK ministers ignored evidence Rwanda violated human rights, court told

African country went back on list of destinations for ‘migration partnership’ after civil servants had ruled it out, judges hear

The UK’s plan to deport people seeking asylum to Rwanda has been challenged in the high court, with claims that ministers deliberately ignored evidence that the east African country had violated human rights, including the right to live free from torture.

Rwanda was put back on to a list of potential destinations for a “migration partnership” after previously being ruled out by civil servants, the court was told.

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Priti Patel meets Albanian police over fast-track removal plan

Home Office aims to crack down on people from ‘safe and prosperous country’ arriving via Channel

Plans to fast-track the removal of Albanian nationals entering the UK via small boat crossings have moved closer after Priti Patel met Albanian police.

Monday’s meeting was part of two days of talks on the sharing of forensics and biometrics to clamp down on anyone entering who has a criminal record in Albania, the Home Office said.

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UK asylum seeker deal leaves Rwanda hostel residents homeless

Survivors of Rwandan genocide were told to vacate hostel two days after Priti Patel signed £120m deal

Former residents of a hostel in Rwanda who were forced to leave under a controversial deal to house asylum seekers flown from the UK say they have been left homeless and destitute while the property remains unused.

The men, all of whom are survivors of the Rwandan genocide, had lived in Hope Hostel in Kigali for up to eight years. But they were told to vacate two days after Priti Patel, the British home secretary, signed a £120m agreement to send refugees arriving in the UK by small boats to the east African country.

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Truss and Sunak face Tory hustings after both say Covid lockdown went too far – as it happened

Latest updates: Tory leadership frontrunner reacts to Sunak comments, saying school closures went too far; pair meet Tory members in Norwich

Lee Cain, who was director of communications in Downing Street during the early phase of the Covid crisis, says Rishi Sunak’s comments about the lockdown policy (see 9.22am and 9.47am) are “simply wrong”.

But Sunak is not saying lockdown should not have happened, as Cain suggests. He is just saying that it was implemented too rigidly, and perhaps for too long, and that more consideration should have been given to the downsides.

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Babies among people who crossed Channel in small boats in last 24 hours

Pause in crossings recorded between Friday and Sunday as almost 5,000 made journey to Dover in August

Babies and young children are among some of the people who have crossed the Channel in small boats to the UK in the last 24 hours after a three-day hiatus in arrivals.

Arriving in Dover by dinghy and other vessels, large numbers of people made the treacherous journey to the Kent coast after a pause in crossings was recorded between Friday and Sunday. Piles of life vests were pictured at the arrival scene at the dockside.

Almost 5,000 people have made the journey so far in August and more than 21,300 people have arrived in the UK by small boats in 2022, according to provisional government figures.

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Priti Patel urges Meta to give up on end-to-end encryption plans

UK home secretary hits out at Facebook’s owner over move that could hinder child abuse investigations

Priti Patel has hit out at Facebook’s plans to encrypt direct messages, even as the company is facing criticism in the US for failing to protect the privacy of women seeking abortions.

The UK home secretary has urged Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, as well as WhatsApp, to give up on its intentions to apply “end-to-end encryption” to direct messages sent from Messenger and Instagram.

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Liz Truss cabinet predictions: who could be in and who would lose out?

Analysis: Kwasi Kwarteng and Thérèse Coffey could be among the big winners if Truss becomes PM

Liz Truss has three weeks before she is likely to walk through No 10’s black door as prime minister, facing a difficult in-tray. Here we take a look at how senior roles could shape up.

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How much longer can Boris Johnson refuse to budge?

A defiant prime minister may try to hold a general election to buy himself more time

Boris Johnson already knew more of his cabinet ministers wanted him gone before he went to face his MPs at prime minister’s questions on Wednesday. Michael Gove, the levelling up secretary, and Simon Hart, the Welsh secretary, had told him to quit.

But the prime minister was immovable. He pressed on with the day, determined to answer questions three hours later from select committee chairs on the price of grain in the Bosphorus and the merits of road pricing at the liaison committee.

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Female trafficking survivor targeted for UK removal to Rwanda, says charity

Exclusive: Women for Refugee Women says it is in touch with first woman considered for removal

A woman in immigration detention has been targeted for removal to Rwanda, a UK refugee charity has said.

Women for Refugee Women said it was in touch with a survivor of trafficking who was recently issued with a notice of intent that she was being considered for removal to Rwanda.

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People arriving in UK on small boats to be electronically tagged

Rights campaigners say ‘appalling’ pilot scheme treats those fleeing conflict and persecution as criminals

Refugee rights campaigners have described a new Home Office scheme to electronically tag asylum seekers as “appalling”, saying the move treats people fleeing conflict and persecution as criminals.

Under a 12-month pilot, which began on Wednesday, some people arriving in the UK in small boats or in the back of lorries will be electronically tagged.

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‘Frankly insulting’: Rwanda resents its portrayal in UK asylum row

Kigali government seeks to shift narrative with managed tours of processing facilities and accommodation for deportees

Rwanda has been caught in the eye of a British political storm this week, and its officials are not happy with how the country has been portrayed.

It was preparing to welcome asylum seekers on Tuesday until a dramatic 11th-hour ruling by the European court of human rights.

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UK to challenge court ruling that halted Rwanda deportations, says minister

Thérèse Coffey says she is sure government will go back to European court of human rights over decision

The UK is likely to challenge the European court of human rights ruling that stopped the deportation to Rwanda of people seeking asylum and is already preparing for the next flight, a cabinet minister has said.

Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary, played down the idea that the UK could withdraw from the European convention on human rights in response to the court’s decision, which halted the flight on Tuesday night.

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Rwanda deportation flight at risk despite loss of two late appeals

Home Office source says individual legal cases mean too few people may be able to board plane anyway

Two last-ditch legal challenges that attempted to halt the inaugural flight carrying asylum seekers to Rwanda have been rejected by judges.

The court of appeal upheld a previous decision to reject an injunction blocking the first flight, which was due to take off for the east African state on Tuesday.

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Children deemed adults by Home Office could be deported to Rwanda

Children’s and refugees charities raise concerns after detention of three children misjudged as adults in offshoring programme

Concerns are mounting that children wrongly assessed as adults by the Home Office could end up being offshored to Rwanda.

The Guardian understands that three age-disputed children who the Home Office declared to be adults and detained in preparation for offshoring to Rwanda have now been released. It is understood that concerns have been raised about whether at least three more detainees threatened with removal to the east African country are children rather than adults.

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Unions call for delay to Rwanda policy until legal position fully tested

Appeal against plan to remove asylum seekers who arrive in the UK via unofficial routes due to take place on Monday

Protests have taken place before a possible first flight removing asylum seekers to Rwanda, as unions said that officials should not be asked to take part in a policy that may subsequently be declared illegal.

With the first flight in the deportation scheme scheduled to take place on Tuesday evening, activists also promised to target the Spanish charter airline understood to be providing the aircraft.

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Hundreds gather in Manchester to oppose Rwanda deportation plan

Protesters march in city centre as anger grows over Priti Patel’s refugee scheme

Hundreds of Mancunians – many of them from charities, campaign groups and religious organisations – gathered in the city’s St Peter’s Square on Sunday to protest against the government’s plan to deport refugees to Rwanda.

With just two days to go before the first refugees are due to board flights to the central African country, the protest was one of a number taking place across the UK, and was happening amid further legal challenges after the high court ruled last week that the flights can go ahead.

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UK deportation flight to Rwanda can go ahead, high court judge rules

Judge refuses to grant interim relief after lawyers for asylum seekers argued policy was unlawful

A high court judge has ruled that a controversial deportation flight to Rwanda that was due to take off early next week can go ahead.

Mr Justice Swift refused to grant interim relief – urgent action in response to an injunction application made by several asylum seekers facing offshoring to Rwanda.

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