Rishi Sunak's small boats plan will fail, says Justin Welby

The Most Rev Justin Welby yesterday told Peers in the House of Lords that Rishi Sunak’s plan to tackle the small boats crisis risked “great damage” to the UK’s reputation at home and abroad.

He added that it was “morally unacceptable” to leave the poorest countries to deal with the migration crisis, with climate change and war pushing more and more people out of their homes to seek refuge in countries such as Britain.

The Church of England’s most senior cleric urged the Government to rethink its flagship Illegal Migration Bill after Rishi Sunak unveiled his pledge to “stop the boats” after becoming Prime Minister last year.

The legislation aims to ensure people who arrive in the UK in small boats would be detained and promptly removed, either to their home country or a third country such as Rwanda.

It includes provisions that would limit the ability of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to prevent the deportation of asylum seekers.

More than 6,000 migrants have been detected crossing the channel so far in 2023, with the Government planning to use disused military camps and a barge as accommodation centres to cope with the numbers.

Criticising the Bill as it faces its first test in the House of Lords, Mr Welby said: “We need a Bill to reform migration. We need a Bill to stop the boats. We need a Bill to destroy the evil tribe of traffickers.

“The tragedy is that without much change this is not that Bill.

“This Bill fails to take a long term and strategic view of the challenges of migration and undermines international co-operation rather than taking an opportunity for the UK to show leadership.”

He added: “Even if this Bill succeeded in temporarily stopping the boats, and I don’t think it will, it won’t stop conflict or climate migration.”

Mr Welby went on: “Of course we cannot take everyone and nor should we, but this Bill has no sense at all of the long-term and the global nature of the challenge that the world faces.

“It ignores the reality that migration must be engaged with at source as well as in the channel.

“As if we as a country were unrelated to the rest of the world.”

Mr Welby added: “It is isolationist, it is morally unacceptable and politically impractical to let the poorest countries deal with the crisis alone and cut our international aid.

“This Bill is an attempt at a short-term fix.

“It risks great damage to the UK’s interests and reputation at home and abroad, let alone the interests of those in need of protection or the nations who together face this challenge.

“Our interests as a nation are closely linked to our reputation for justice and the rule of law and to our measured language, calm decision and careful legislation.

“None of those are seen here.

“This nation should lead internationally, not stand apart.”

Home Office minister Lord Murray of Blidworth faced jeers and shouts of “shame” in the Lords as he argued the Bill was a “compassionate response” to the small boats problem.

He said: “We simply cannot continue with a situation whereby year-on-year tens of thousands of people make the dangerous, illegal and unnecessary journey across the channel in circumvention of our immigration controls.”

Responding to the cleric’s remarks outside the chamber, immigration minister Robert Jenrick told the BBC: “There’s nothing moral about allowing the pernicious trade of people smugglers to continue… I disagree with him respectfully.”

But rejecting the Archbishop’s criticism, House Of Cards author Lord Dobbs stressed the need to tackle the people smugglers.

The Tory peer and former adviser to the Thatcher government said: “They trade in lies, they trade lives.

“It is our moral obligation to stop them, to bring an end to the unimaginable pain of mothers and fathers watching their children drowning off our shores in the channel.

“No amount of handwringing or bell ringing is going to do that.”​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​