Lords Want Rwanda Safeguards In Place Before Treaty Can Be Ratified

An influential House of Lords committee has concluded that Rishi Sunak’s treaty declaring Rwanda is a safe country for asylum seekers should not be ratified until MPs are certain that the protections it aims to offer are in place.

The International Agreements Committee said in a new report published today that ministers should provide Parliament with more information to prove that the “legal and practical” steps needed to ensure Rwanda is a safe country for asylum seekers have been taken, before the treaty is agreed to by Parliament.

The IAC is a House of Lords committee that scrutinises all treaties that are laid before Parliament. The report on the treaty is due to be discussed in the Lords on Monday.  

While the treaty “might in time provide the basis” to be able to declare Rwanda safe, “as things stand the arrangements it provides for are incomplete,” their report released today has said. 

The treaty was signed by Home Secretary James Cleverly at the start of December after a Supreme Court ruling prevented the government from deporting illegal migrants to Rwanda – a key element of its Illegal Migration Bill – on human rights grounds. The treaty is a separate document to the legislation that is expected to be voted on in the House of Commons on Wednesday evening.

Among measures included in the treaty, the IAC has highlighted a new asylum law in Rwanda system for ensuring that nobody is returned to a country where they could be in danger as elements that would need to already be in place before it can be ratified. 

Chair of the committee, Labour’s Lord Peter Goldsmith, said that “the Government should not ratify the Rwanda Treaty until Parliament is satisfied that the protections it provides have been fully implemented,