Just weeks out from calling the general election, the Conservative Party achieved a policy triumph.
Its proposal to resettle some asylum seekers who arrived in the UK in Rwanda passed through parliament after years of political and legal wrangling.
The flagship policy — based on Australia’s previous Coalition government’s Stop the Boats scheme — was its plan to crackdown on record numbers of small boats arriving across the English Channel.
In what some argue was a political stunt, the Tories wasted no time showing the full force of their new powers.
Asylum seekers were detained in raids across the country just days after the bill was signed into law, but months before the first flights were due to take off.
But there’s just one problem: the policy didn’t move the dial for voters.
Multiple surveys outlined immigration was not in the top three election issues for Britons, while Labour made it clear it would scrap the policy.
Labour’s plan, while offering little detail as to how it will work in practice, involves establishing a Border Security Command centre with hundreds of new investigators, intelligence officers and cross-border police officers.
Keir Starmer says this will “smash the gangs” facilitating illegal small-boat crossings, but it’s still unclear how.
His plan to return those arriving illegally back to their home country won’t be straightforward either.
Given the backlog of asylum claims caused by delays to getting the Rwanda policy off the ground, and record numbers of people arriving by boat, an incoming Labour government faces plenty of headaches.
