Former prime minister Boris Johnson has joined a mounting revolt by right-wing Conservative MPs against Rishi Sunak's Rwanda bill.
Sunak is facing a Tory rebellion over concerns that his Rwanda migration policy will be "scuppered" because, in its current form, the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill allows asylums seekers to lodge individual legal challenges against their deportation, said The Times.
The PM faced a major "blow" to his authority over the weekend, said the BBC, when two deputy chairs of the Tory party, Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith, joined more than 60 MPs in backing amendments to the bill, which will return to the Commons tomorrow. And a further intervention from Johnson, whose administration introduced the Rwanda scheme, has left Sunak facing a "Conservative meltdown", said The Guardian.
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Government insiders believe the bill will pass the committee stage on Tuesday without amendments, but the third reading on Wednesday will be a "steeper challenge", as it would take just 29 Tory MPs to rebel, or 57 to abstain, for the bill to fail.
In an attempt to stave off revolt, Downing Street may announce plans to move 150 judges to the upper tribunal – the body that will hear individual legal appeals lodged by asylum seekers under the new legislation – in order to "fast-track" the process, according to The Times. But former immigration minister Robert Jenrick, as well as allies of leading Conservative rebels, told the Financial Times that the plans "did not go far enough".
Even if Sunak does manage to get the bill passed, the "bigger problem for the PM is the rot", said Sky News's Beth Rigby. His government will face individual court battles and "perhaps a tussle" with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. And if in the end his policy doesn't work, he'll "face the wrath not just of many of his MPs but many former Conservative voters too".
