The Tories’ so-called "Illegal Migration Bill", presented to the House of Commons on Tuesday by Home Secretary Suella Braverman, is unintentionally well-named.  Because according to the UN High Commission on Refugees, in terms of international law, this bill is itself "illegal".

 

    The UNHCR says it ”is profoundly concerned by the asylum bill... which "compels the Home Secretary to deny access to the UK asylum system to those who arrive irregularly. (...) This would be a clear breach of the Refugee Convention”.

 

    Of course breaking international law is par for this government's course...  And all the more so, if it means playing to its right-wing electorate and appealing to the

far-right - just 2 years or less, before a general election.

 

    So no wonder the "debate" (if that's what it can be called!) in the Commons revolved around name-calling, with Labour accused by Sunak as being a bunch of

”Iefty lawyers” and in favour of "free movement”!

 

    If only it was!  But Labour's only objection to Braverman's policy is that it is not effective enough at stopping the people smugglers and the "small boats”!

 

    On the other hand, unlike Labour's MPs, BBC football commentator and former ace striker (England's 4th highest scorer), Gary Lineker, stood up for refugees

against Braverman et al, tweeting that the kind of language she uses sounds like the rhetoric heard in Germany in the 1930s.  Yes, the time of Hitler's rise to

power.  He's not wrong.

 

    But such sentiments weren't confined to Germany in those years of severe economic recession - times much like now.  They were well-represented in Britain, by a large section of the business class, news editors and by members of the royal family; something the anti-Lineker mob wouldn't care to acknowledge!

 

    Braverman claims that her Bill will stop the small boats and stop the people smugglers.  Yet the Bill, which will "enable the detention of illegal arrivals, without bail or judicial review within the first 28 days of detention, until they can be removed” isn't aimed at "people smugglers” but the people they smuggle.  And it criminalizes them automatically.

 

    As the UN says, the government has made it impossible to be a "legal" arrival, since it insists that asylum seekers must put in a claim in their first safe country.  Given that Britain is an island, how is that even possible?  It puts them in a "Catch 22".

 

    Arguing that refugees must be stopped, Braverman mentions "the overwhelming volume of illegal migrants".  But if the 160,000 waiting for their claims to be processed (for lack of Home Office staff!) is anything to go by, this is a tiny "volume".  It is even fewer than the 170,000 NHS vacancies crying out to be filled.  That should speak for itself.