In June 2022, Kidus, 30, from Eritrea, came to the UK in a small boat with around two dozen other people.

He still has the video on his phone showing everyone – including some women and children – clinging on to the dinghy wearing identical red lifejackets.

Back then, the government had already announced plans to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.

Despite being sent a letter warning he’s being considered for removal, he’s never thought it could really happen until now.

Kidus – not his real name – says before he left France, one of the people smugglers reassured him the government wouldn’t go through with it: the Rwanda policy simply wouldn’t affect him.

But earlier this month, one of his friends from Eritrea, who was on the same boat across the Channel, was detained when attending a routine appointment with the Home Office at a site in Liverpool.

As a result, Kidus is now considering not going to his next fortnightly meeting, even though attending the appointments is a condition of his immigration bail.

“If I didn’t go there, I know they’ll drop my case,” he tells us, concerned his asylum application will be cancelled.

But he adds: “If I go I know they will detain me. So, I’m just confused what I’m going to do.”

A document drawn up by Home Office officials revealed only 2,143 of the 5,700 asylum seekers Rwanda has agreed to accept actually attend check-ins and “can be located for detention”.

If people like Kidus stop attending, they will join the remaining 3,557 migrants who are currently missing.

The shared house Kidus lives in is paid for by the Home Office – so his address makes it almost impossible to disappear. But this means he knows he could be detained at any time.

“I’m always just frightened here. So, they might come at night or day and I’m always thinking that they’ll come and they’ll take me to detention. I’m not feeling safe here,” he says.

Kidus has stopped attending college where he was learning English and carries the phone numbers of legal firms with him at all times.

He speaks to his friend on the phone – who is now being held in a detention centre near Heathrow.

Nahom, not his real name, 26, estimates he’s among around 40 asylum seekers there who’ve been told they’ll be sent to Rwanda.

Follow Sky News on WhatsApp

Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News

Tap here

“It’s like a nightmare, it’s like a prison and I don’t like it here. I’m really stressed and panicked about the situation,” Nahom tells us from the site almost 100 miles away.

He admits he has been able to meet his solicitor but says he’s feeling increasingly desperate about being faced with the prospect of being sent to Rwanda.

“They can send my body, but not me alive,” he says. “I’m just giving up.”

In west London, we meet Nura, in her 20s, whose real name is withheld and who has made the decision to keep attending meetings with the Home Office because she doesn’t want to be kicked out of her taxpayer-funded hotel.

Read more:
Sunak’s Rwanda plan is at risk of being undermined
UK considered Iraq for asylum seekers in Rwanda-type deal

But each time she goes to sign in she’s terrified of being detained.

“Sometimes I say ‘why me’?” she asks tearfully, looking at her “notice of intent” letter warning her she’s being considered for removal to Rwanda.

“It’s not a safe country,” she adds. “What is the difference from Eritrea? It’s the same.”

Nura says when she came to the UK by small boat, she believed women wouldn’t be sent to Rwanda. She says she wouldn’t have come if she’d known she was at risk.

Kidus says the same thing: “If I’d have known this I’d have never come here.” He added he’d have instead gone to “Belgium or France, or Germany maybe”.

Now they’re here, their only hope is they won’t be chosen for detention.

The government remains determined to get the first flights to Rwanda within weeks.

Ahead of a general election, the plan has become a clear dividing line between the Conservatives and Labour, which has vowed to scrap the scheme if it comes to power.

Teachers in English schools will not be allowed to teach children that they can change their gender identity, according to reports.

Age limits are also set to be imposed for the first time on when children can be taught sex education.

The Times reports that education ministers will warn schools in England today that gender identity is “highly contested” and that teaching the issue could have “damaging implications”.

If asked, school staff should teach the “biological facts” about sex, the government will say, The Times adds.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has become concerned gender identity is becoming “embedded” in schools as an uncontested fact, the newspaper says.

Under other proposals, schools will be told not to teach children any form of sex education until year 5, when pupils are aged nine.

The plans will also rule out any explicit conversations about sex until the age of 13, The Times report also says.

Thirteen would also be the age threshold for pupils to be taught about contraception, sexually transmitted infections, and abortion.

Read more from Sky News:
Doctor diagnosed with incurable cancer free of disease
Woman partially paralysed after star’s stage dive into crowd
Man bludgeoned friend to death with hammer

Follow Sky News on WhatsApp

Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News

Tap here

The new guidance is reportedly part of the government’s response to concerns children are receiving age-inappropriate relationships, sex and health education (RSHE).

Schools will reportedly be required to provide parents with samples of the material their children will be taught.

RSHE became compulsory in all English schools in September 2020.

The existing guidance outlines broad lesson modules, stating primary school children should be taught about alternative types of families and healthy relationships.

Secondary-school-aged children are taught more complex topics, including puberty, sexual relationships, consent, unsafe relationships, and online harms.

The Department for Education said it could not confirm the newspaper reports, and that it would not speculate on leaks.

Landlords have been accused of “holding parliament hostage” with the threat of selling up to stop tenants’ rights from being strengthened.

A fresh row erupted on the eve of the controversial Renters Reform Bill coming to the House of Lords for its second reading, as one landlord group warned of a supply crisis in the private sector.

Analysis of government data by the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) found that in the last six months of 2023, 45% of people in need of homeless prevention support said the reason was because the property owner planned to sell.

This was more than twice as much as the next most common reason, which was landlords planning to re-let the property.

Separately, data from Rightmove found that 50,000 rental properties are needed to bring the supply of rental homes back to pre-pandemic levels.

The NRLA said landlords need “confidence to stay in the market” and warned peers against attempting to strengthen the reform bill to give renters more rights, after it was watered down by MPs in the Commons.

They said the data comes in the wake of concerns being raised by campaign group Generation Rent, who have warned that landlords selling up is a leading cause of homelessness.

But Generation Rent accused the NRLA of “cynically” using their concerns “to hold parliament hostage to the idea that they will sell up over even the smallest strengthening of tenants’ rights”.

Ben Twomey, Chief Executive of Generation Rent, said: “Long term, if landlords sell up it makes little difference to the housing market.

“Bricks and mortar do not sink into the ground, and the home could be bought by another landlord, a first-time buyer or even repurposed for social housing.

“There will always be some landlords wanting to sell, for example because they are retiring or because their mortgages have become too costly.”

‘Relocation relief required for renters’

Mr Twomey said the short-term issue is that “tenants have an appalling lack of protection when landlords choose to sell up”.

He called on ministers to incentivise homes being sold to existing tenants if they can afford to buy, or incentivise selling homes with sitting tenants so they can stay in the property if it changes ownership to a new landlord.

The campaign group also want landlords to be prevented from selling a property for two years after a tenancy has begun, and a relocation relief for renters evicted through no fault of their own so they don’t need to pay for the final two months rent while they look for a new home.

Why are landlords selling up?

The NRLA said there are various reasons for landlords selling up but the key issues are growing costs and uncertainty over the Renters Reform bill.

The legislation, intended to redress the power balance between renters and landlords, has been mired in delay and controversy with the government heavily criticised for diluting some of its flagship proposals, including the ban on no-fault evictions.

First promised by the Tories five years ago, the ban has been delayed indefinitely pending court reforms, in what has widely been seen as a concession to landlords.

Read More:
Almost one million renters given no-fault evictions since Tories promised to scrap them
More than 100 MPs earn over £10,000 a year as landlords

Peers urged to ‘rescue’ reform bill

The Renters Reform Coalition, which includes Generation Rent, has called on peers to “rescue this watered down bill”, saying it is a failure in its current form and “will preserve the central power imbalance at the root of why renting in England is in crisis”.

👉 Listen above then tap here to follow Politics at Jack and Sam’s wherever you get your podcasts 👈

The RCC want a package of reforms including the end of no-fault evictions, four months’ notice when they are evicted rather than two and limiting in-tenancy rent increases in line with inflation or wage growth.

As well as insecure tenancies, renters are facing soaring rents and poor conditions amid a wider housing crisis which at its heart is a problem of insufficient supply and spiralling affordability

Ben Beadle, Chief Executive of the National Residential Landlords Association, acknowledged the wider problems and said that “all parties need to accept widespread calls for policies to boost supply in the private rented sector”.

He added: “Landlords selling up is the single biggest challenge renters face. The only answer is to ensure responsible landlords have the confidence to stay in the market and sustain tenancies.

“As peers debate the Renters (Reform) Bill, it is vital that it works for landlords as well as tenants. As it stands it would achieve this balance. We are calling on peers to support the Bill to give the sector certainty about the future.”