The Court of Appeal’s decision on the Rwanda flights is less clear-cut than the outcome suggests, writes Dr Romit Bhandari
- The context, background and legal argument in the Court of Appeal decision that stopped the government from forcibly removing ten asylum seekers to Rwanda.
- The decision is less of a success for asylum seekers than widely believed.
By majority decision on 29 June, the Court of Appeal effectively halted the UK government’s plans to relocate asylum seekers to Rwanda.
The prevention of asylum seekers arriving by boat—the base repetition of ‘stop the boats’—is the government’s flagship policy. Indeed, this litigation runs alongside recent legislative efforts to deny access to asylum, such as the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 and the Illegal Migration Bill. Public interest in this case has therefore been understandably high.
The outcome appears to be a vindication of both individual rights and the rule of law, with the court underlining the ‘real risks that asylum claims would not be properly and fairly determined in Rwanda’.
