You’d have thought the Tories would have wanted to give their illegal migration bill – insert your own gags – a good send-off for its second reading. But Rishi Sunak chose to be 8,000 miles away in San Diego. Far away from the scene of the crime. And the government also insisted on two ministerial statements – one of them hardly pressing – to delay the debate until late in the day. Almost as if they wanted it over and done with. As it was the government benches were half empty. Most of the saner Tories had decided to give it a swerve. Not brave enough to speak out in the chamber.
The debate started with a point of order from Labour’s Clive Lewis. The bill came with its own health warning that there was a less that 50/50 chance of the government surviving a legal challenge. So why waste parliament’s time? Surely it would be better to let the courts battle this one out first. Suella Braverman disagreed. Labour hadn’t understood. This wasn’t how it worked. What was going to happen was that the UK was going to kick asylum seekers out regardless of international law. A cunning plan to turn us into a rogue state.
