Priti Patel has not released key documents from Home Office officials describing how they should decide which migrants are eligible to move to Rwanda, according to the leader of the UK’s largest civil servants’ union.
Mark Servotka, secretary general of the Union of Public and Commercial Services (PCS), which represents border and departmental staff, said the interior secretary’s decision to keep the framework documents explaining the government’s offshore policy raises doubts that it is “built on sand” and a cynical attempt to earn “cheap political points”.
In a Guardian article, Servotka also vowed to support legal challenges to the policy on behalf of Interior Ministry officials, who will be asked to deal with its “catastrophic consequences”.
This comes amid a growing suspicion that the policy announced last month in the wake of the Partygate scandal was ill-considered and the government is expected to suspend it in court. Boris Johnson on Wednesday tried to accuse “liberal lawyers” of delaying the implementation of the policy.
Servotka wrote that last month the government was asked to provide documents outlining the roles of union members who are expected to implement the policy, but none were revealed. He said it was after a similar failure last year to fully disclose documents related to his failed repulsion policy.
“Our negotiators at the Ministry of Interior requested political and operational documents, but they were not received. “We were forced to follow a similar process in the case of repulsion, when the documents provided were heavily edited,” he wrote.
He added: “One can only conclude that either Rwanda’s political messages are built on sand and there is no political framework to facilitate it, or they have something to hide.
The government has promised not to send anyone to Rwanda before responding to the union’s request, Servotka said.
“We have made it clear to the government that they are required to exercise their discretion in a transparent manner. In another important step, we received an assurance from the Secretary of the Interior that no action would be taken to relocate an individual refugee to Rwanda before we received a reply to our letter. We will strive to extend this confidence until the legality of the proposals is verified, “he wrote.
Patel announced the policy last month after promising a £ 120m payment to the Rwandan government – a payment that does not cover the cost of flight, security or living.
According to the plans, men and women arriving in the UK on irregular routes will be treated in the UK. If they do not qualify for asylum, they can be sent 4,500 miles to Kigali, where they will be encouraged to settle in housing paid for by the United Kingdom. They have no right to return to the United Kingdom and there is no formal appeal procedure against the United Kingdom’s decision.
Last week, the Guardian revealed that the PCS is one of four organizations challenging the policy in court.
Johnson said he wanted to send migrants to the authoritarian East African country before the end of May, but his spokesman told reporters Tuesday that the program would begin “within months”.
Speaking at Southampton airport, Johnson told reporters Wednesday that the plans would be challenged in court, but defended the execution.
“Of course, there will be legitimate eagles, liberal lawyers who will try to make this difficult to settle. “We always knew it would happen, but it’s a very, very sensible thing,” he said.
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Servotka wrote that after being part of a successful lawsuit against the government’s policy of repulsion, the union supports a similar challenge against offshoring.
“As we did in the repulsion case, this union intends to do everything possible to prevent our diligent civil servants from being put back in this unfair position,” he wrote.
An analysis of government data on Wednesday showed that 7,240 people arrived in the UK in small boats from France in the four months since early 2022.
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