The Home Office has hired an aircraft hangar and a fake plane for security officials to practise forcing migrants onto deportation flights headed to Rwanda, it has been revealed.
Staff will imitate situations the Government expects them to have to deal with, including special training for “disruptive” people.
The training includes what to do if anyone gets violent, how to handle Extinction Rebellion style protests where people “play dead” and refuse to move and demonstrations where campaigners outside the airbase try to hold off flights.
It is estimated that five officers will be needed for each migrant, The Times revealed on Friday.
The Home Office confirmed the plans and said they were important for staff to be able to “professionally to the challenges of removing people with no right to be in the UK”.
The department said: “This includes practical sessions so escorts have the skills they need to deal with different scenarios.
“As we ramp up removal activity we will continue to ensure new escorts have the training facilities necessary.”
Those being trained are immigration enforcement officers and escorting staff from the private security company Mitie, which runs asylum and detention facilities for the Government.
It comes after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said he is “determined" to get his Rwanda legislation through parliament.
Many are expecting some resistance in the House of Lords, with some peers already expressing unease about the plan and ministers braced for a battle with the Upper House over the Bill.
Mr Sunak, who on Thursday urged the Lords not to block the "will of the people", said he wanted to get the scheme "up and running" as soon as possible.
Peers could seriously frustrate that ambition, with Downing Street likely to face attempts by peers to introduce a range of amendments to the proposed legislation.
Former Scottish Tory leader Baroness Ruth Davidson cast doubt policy will ever see asylum seekers deported to east Africa, telling BBC Radio 4 there "are dogs in the street that know" that deportation flights are "probably never going to happen".
The Bill is likely to receive its second reading by the end of January, with February 12, 14 and 19 pencilled in for debate at the committee stage.
It is possible that the third reading of the Bill could happen around the middle of March.
Mr Sunak played down the prospect of having to pack the Lords with Tory peers to get the legislation through, adding that the country was fed up with the "merry-go-round" on the issue.
Speaking to reporters in Hampshire, said: "We shouldn't be talking about these things because the House of Lords will be able to see that this is part of the strong majority in the Commons, they can see that this is a national priority.
"And I would urge them strongly to crack on with it because we all just want to get this done."
Mr Sunak has made the Rwanda policy - first proposed in 2022 while Boris Johnson was in Number 10 - central to his premiership, forming part of his pledge to stop small boats of migrants from coming to Britain over the English Channel.
Under the plan, migrants who cross the Channel in small boats could be sent to Rwanda rather than being allowed to seek asylum in the UK.
The legislation, along with a recently signed treaty with Kigali, is aimed at ensuring the scheme is legally watertight after a Supreme Court ruling against it last year.
Mr Sunak will hope to have flights in the air ahead of the next general election, expected to be called in the second half of the year.
