Migration - Agreement: London tightens immigration law
The UK wants to seal itself off from migrants with significantly tougher barriers for foreign skilled workers and a new asylum pact for deportations to Rwanda. Home Secretary James Cleverly signed a treaty in the East African country with which the Conservative government wants to circumvent a ruling by the British Supreme Court.
Migration has become more important for the Tories a few months before the next election. According to polls, the issue is now a priority for many Conservative voters. As a result, the right wing of the party is putting Prime Minister Rishi Sunak under loud pressure to significantly reduce the net immigration of 745,000 people. After all, Brexit was supposed to stop migration and create better and better-paid jobs for Britons - at least that was one of the Conservatives' core promises.
The new agreement
The agreement stipulates that asylum seekers who enter the UK irregularly will be sent to Rwanda on a "one-way ticket" regardless of their origin. A return to the UK is excluded. The Supreme Court recently rejected this as unlawful, citing deficits in the rule of law in the East African country, among other things.
The new agreement should now include assurances from the authoritarian Rwandan leadership that it will not deport asylum seekers to their home country - and thus dispel the Supreme Court's concerns. Should Rwanda wish to deport a migrant, for example due to a criminal offense, British and Rwandan judges will jointly decide whether the person should remain in Africa or be returned to the UK.
The next step is for the British parliament to declare Rwanda a safe third country. Observers are concerned that Sunak could leave the European Convention on Human Rights under pressure from the right in order to avoid legal resistance from Strasbourg.
Start still unclear
Cleverly is already the third Home Secretary to try his hand at the Rwanda plan in a year and a half. "Home Secretary 3 - Migrants 0", commented BBC reporter Chris Mason. The government emphasizes that it wants to fly out the first asylum seekers before the election. The date has not yet been set, with speculation about May or October 2024. In the polls, the Tories are far behind the opposition Labour party, which is currently likely to form the next government.
Sunak still wants to achieve a turnaround with the anti-migration course. However, the mainly symbolic Rwanda policy is only one building block. Will a plane ever take off? Completely unclear. Even Cleverly did not want to commit to a date.
Criticism from experts
The measures that Cleverly announced in parliament are therefore likely to have a much greater impact. In future, foreign skilled workers will have to earn at least 38,700 pounds (45,150 euros) instead of the previous 26,200 pounds per year in order to be allowed to enter the country. Nurses are exempt, but are no longer allowed to bring their families with them, as are students.
Cleverly proudly announced the biggest drop in net migration in recent British history. He expects around 300,000 fewer immigrants on balance. "Enough is enough", wrote Prime Minister Sunak in a guest article for the "Sun" newspaper. There was also approval from the right-wing Tory party. However, hardliners such as former Home Secretary Suella Braverman immediately called for even tougher measures.
Experts are critical of the plans. "The signal is: we don't want you", said one EU diplomat. The business community expects the shortage of skilled workers to increase further. "Once again, the interests of business are losing out to the internal affairs of the Conservative Party," said Neil Carberry, head of the recruitment association REC, in the Financial Times newspaper.
Private life is also affected: Britons will have to earn more than 38,000 pounds in future if they want their foreign partners to join them. That is more than twice as much as before - and more than the average income. 73 percent of Britons are now too poor to marry a foreigner, commented satirist Tom Peck in the Times.
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Source: www.stern.de
