Boris Johnson is bracing for a battle with an ‘army of politically motivated lawyers’ over the government’s new migrant relocation plans.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has warned the public that his plan to toughen up Britain’s asylum claims process is under threat from legal challenges, which he claims he is aiming to fight.
According to the British Premier, an “army of politically motivated lawyers” is vying to disrupt the plan to send thousands of illegal migrants to Rwanda for processing, seemingly in the hopes of making Britain less attractive to those looking to illegally cross the English Channel in small boats.
While those within the government have sworn that the new plans are legal and that they are “fully compliant” with Britain’s international legal obligations, The Telegraph reports that Boris Johnson himself seems to expect that the new plan will end up in the courts.
Despite this, Johnson has vowed he will fight any legal challenges put before the government, and says that he will even go as far as implementing so-called “legal reforms” if necessary to see the plan go through.
“I promise that we will do whatever it takes to deliver this new approach initially within the limits of the existing legal and constitutional frameworks,” he said, adding that he as premier was “also prepared to explore any and all further legal reforms which may be necessary”.
“If this country is seen as a soft touch for illegal migration by some of our partners, it is precisely because we have such a formidable army of politically motivated lawyers who, for years, have made it their business to thwart removals and frustrate the Government,” he also said.
Border protection measures and enforcement have repeatedly been frustrated by hostile lawyers and legal experts in the past, with harsher UK migration rules being regularly ripped up by legal challenge under Conservative Party rules since they first took office all the way back in 2010 under David Cameron.
Things have not gotten much better since, with the government losing a high court battle in January this year over the age assessments of two migrants who arrived in Britain by lorry.
What’s more, suspicion has been raised as to the timing of the new Rwanda relocation plan, with Britain’s leftist opposition leader Keir Starmer suggesting that the measure is merely an attempt at distraction by an embattled Boris Johnson.
There has been a pattern of more strident immigration announcements coinciding with Boris Johnson getting bad press cycles over the so-called “Partygate” scandal which saw the PM break his own Chinese Coronavirus lockdown rules.
The plan formed part of what was known as “Operation Red Meat“, which saw popular policies pushed out into the public view seemingly in the hopes of saving the Johnson premiership, a plan that seems to have previously succeeded.
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