Ministers urged to shelve illegal migration bill until supreme court ruling after 11 defeats in Lords – UK politics live | Politics

Good morning. Yesterday the illegal migration bill was hacked to pieces in the House of Lords. Peers inflicted 11 defeats on the government. This was not quite a record – in January last year there were 14 defeats one night on the police, crime, sentencing and courts bill – but, if the amendments were allowed to stand, they would in effect emasculate the bill, and prevent it from achieving much of what the government intends it to achieve.

Here is Rajeev Syal’s story about the voting last night.

And this is from the Lib Dem office in the Lords, listing the size of the majorities against the government.

Of course, the Lords does not have the final say. The bill will go back to the Commons where MPs will overturn most or all of the Lords amendment. At that point the “ping pong” process starts, when the bill shuttles between the Lords and the Commons until they agree on a text. Sometimes ministers concede on certain points in the face of pressure from the Lords, but normally peers back down and let the Commons win on all substantial points because it is the elected chamber.

Will that happen this time? Probably. But this morning Alex Carlile, the former Lib Dem MP who is now a crossbench peer, and who tabled two of the amendments that triggered government defeats last night, claimed that the Lords would put up much more resistance than usual on this bill. In an interview with the Today, when it was put to him that it would be wrong for the Lords to block a bill whose aim (stopping the boats) is one supported by the public at large, Carlile said he did not accept that. He replied:

Well, the government’s interpretation of the people is an odd one because I believe, and many others believe, that the people do not want people who have legitimate claims for asylum refused consideration of that claim just because they came in a lorry or in a small boat.

And we have a number of legal principles, well developed over the years, that ensure that people should not be detained unless there is a real purpose in their detention, and an end in sight for their detention.

Those as just a couple of examples of the sorts of issues that the government will have to resolve, otherwise we will have the longest ping pong ever.

Carlile also said that the purpose of the bill was now “dead” and that the government should shelve it until the supreme court has resolved whether asylum seekers can be sent to Rwanda. If the court finds against the government, the bill becomes pointless anyway, he argued.

He told the programme:

The bill should be dead because the purpose of the bill is dead.

We were told that this bill would stop the boats. It hasn’t stopped the boats – June had record numbers.

We were told that it would provide for refugees and asylum seekers to get to a safe country. We were told that same country was Rwanda. Rwanda is not a safe country. The court of appeal has held that Rwanda is not a safe country, because there was a risk of being people, the term is refouled, sent on to the very country which they were escaping from injustice in.

And the role of the House of Lords, above all other purposes of that chamber, is to use its experience and expertise to revise and amend draft legislation so it’s fit for purpose. Well, this whole bill has no purpose left at the moment.

What the government really should have done is park it, leave it until the supreme court has decided whether the court of appeal was right, and then, if appropriate, bring it back to parliament and go through it all over again.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Morning: Rishi Sunak chairs cabinet.

10am: Michael Gove speaks at the Local Government Association conference. Angela Rayner, the deputy Labour leader, is speaking at 2.40pm.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

2pm: Rishi Sunak gives evidence to the Commons liaison committee.

2pm: Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, gives evidence to the Covid inquiry.

After 3.30pm: Peers consider the Commons amendments to the strkes (minimum service levels) bill and to the national security bill.

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