Rwanda bill sent back to MPs after peers inflicts new defeats on government

Published

1 year ago

March 20, 2024

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A government bill centred on deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda has been sent back to MPs after peers rejected it.

The Safety of Rwanda Bill had been debated in the House of Lords after their previous changes were dismissed by the Commons earlier this week.

In the upper chamber, the government lost seven votes by margins of around 50. The last time peers voted on amendments, the government lost by around 100 votes.

This means that a new vote will need to be scheduled in the Commons for MPs to consider the changes.

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While Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said he wants flights to get off the ground in the spring, it is unclear if the two parliamentary houses will be able to reach a consensus before they go on recess next week.

The defeats for the government included:

• An amendment to make sure the legislation has “due regard” for international law, by 271 to 228;

• An amendment that states it is only safe in Rwanda while the provision in the treaty with the UK is in place, by 285 to 230;

• An amendment to check whether Rwanda complies with its treaty obligations, by 276 to 226;

• An amendment allowing individual appeals based on safety in Rwanda, by 263 to 233;

• An amendment requiring age assessments for those being deported to be carried out by the local authority, by 249 to 219;

• An amendment preventing those who say they are victims of modern slavery from being deported, by 251 to 214;

• An amendment to prevent the deportation of those who have served with or for the UK’s armed forces, by 248 to 209.

Labour’s Lord Vernon Coaker was among those who spoke against the government’s proposals.

He criticised the Commons for rejecting all the Lords’ initial amendments “carte blanche”.

Lord Coaker also bemoaned the continuing parliamentary ping pong which is set to continue after the Easter Christmas recess, saying it was the “government’s own management of its own timetable”.

Lord Alf Dubs, who arrived in Britain in 1939 on the Kindertransport – which organised the rescue of children from the Nazis – told the Lords it would be “an appalling dereliction of our responsibilities to vulnerable young people” if children who had been wrongly assessed as adults were sent to Rwanda.

On the other side of the debate, government and Conservative peers repeated the previous arguments, including that Rwanda was being judged as “not safe” because it’s “black”.

Lord Peter Lilley said: “I think we’re making a bit too much of the lack of provisions and safeguards now about one black country, when we had no concerns about a list of white countries.”

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And Lord Keith Stewart – who is a government law officer – said: “Accountability is at the heart of democracy. That is why the government are fully entitled to bring forward the bill and why much of the criticism directed at them for doing so is fundamentally misconceived.”

Earlier in the day, Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer clashed over the policy – with the Labour leader branding it a “gimmick”, and claiming that the prime minister doesn’t believe in it.

Politics

Jingye and Whitehall officials hold talks over British Steel future

Published

5 mins ago

July 9, 2025

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Jingye and Whitehall officials hold talks over British Steel future

The Chinese owner of British Steel has held fresh talks with government officials in a bid to break the impasse over ministers’ determination not to compensate it for seizing control of the company.

Sky News has learnt that executives from Jingye Group met senior civil servants from the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) late last week to discuss ways to resolve the standoff.

Whitehall sources said the talks had been cordial, but that no meaningful progress had been made towards a resolution.

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Jingye wants the government to agree to pay it hundreds of millions of pounds for taking control of British Steel in April – a move triggered by the Chinese group’s preparations for the permanent closure of its blast furnaces in Scunthorpe.

Such a move would have cost thousands of jobs and ended Britain’s centuries-old ability to produce virgin steel.

Jingye had been in talks for months to seek £1bn in state aid to facilitate the Scunthorpe plant’s transition to greener steelmaking, but was offered just half that sum by ministers.

British Steel has not yet been formally nationalised, although that remains a probable outcome.

Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, has previously dismissed the idea of compensating Jingye, saying British Steel’s equity was essentially worthless.

Last month, he met his Chinese counterpart, where the issue of British Steel was discussed between the two governments in person for the first time.

Jingye has hired the leading City law firm Linklaters to explore the recovery of hundreds of millions of pounds it invested in the Scunthorpe-based company before the government seized control of it.

News of last week’s meeting comes as British steelmakers face an anxious wait to learn whether their exports to the US face swingeing tariffs as part of US President Donald Trump’s trade war.

Sky News’s economics and data editor, Ed Conway, revealed this week that the UK would miss a White House-imposed deadline to agree a trade deal on steel and aluminium this week.

Jingye declined to comment, while a spokesman for the Department for Business and Trade said: “We acted quickly to ensure the continued operations of the blast furnaces but recognise that securing British Steel’s long-term future requires private sector investment.

“We have not nationalised British Steel and are working closely with Jingye on options for the future, and we will continue work on determining the best long-term sustainable future for the site.”