Rishi Sunak will not “stop the boats” carrying asylum seekers across the Channel. He still promotes that general ambition, but with synthetic enthusiasm that contains more exasperation than confidence.
Even if the scheme for removing asylum claimants to Rwanda were up and running, the deterrent effect on people launching dinghies from Calais is doubtful. Facilities in Kigali can handle only a few hundred cases at most. UK government policy envisages deporting thousands. But that’s academic anyway, because the supreme court has ruled that Rwanda cannot be considered a “safe third country”, so sending refugees there would be unlawful.
