The ‘Rwandan Policy’ refers to the UK government’s strategy for repatriating individuals who enter the UK through ‘unlawful means’ to Rwanda. Since April 2022, the pursuit of preventing individuals from seeking asylum in Britain has been consistently upheld by successive Prime Ministers and Home Secretaries.
Last week, all five judges of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom were in agreement when they ruled that the government’s ‘Rwanda Policy’ was unlawful. The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom serves as the highest authority in legal and public matters, and its interpretation of the law can restrict what the government can and cannot do. Its decisions are informed by precedent, traditions, and current legislation. Only the Parliament in London can challenge its position, as it has the power to pass legislation that could overrule the Courts.
The new UK government has pledged to enact emergency laws to push through the policy, indicating a likelihood of sustained circulation of racist and xenophobic rhetoric against refugees and asylum seekers in the mainstream media. Despite legal and public opposition, the Conservative Party remains committed to this objective, seeing it as aligned with their internal democratic processes.
The Supreme Court’s ruling, while significant in highlighting the government’s actions, may also be deemed relatively insignificant in the broader context. It reflects a recurring pattern where, despite public and legal opposition, the government opts for conservative choices. The historical and contemporary nature of how the Westminster Parliament defines and controls its borders has often involved violence and dehumanisation.
It seems our current options for any next election is a Conservative party trying to outdo itself on racism at every turn, and a Labour party leadership trying to keep up. In either case, the concentration of power in the hands of a few, without popular election or checks and balances, raises concerns about the position of the Prime Minister being able to hold dictatorial power by combining roles afforded to its holder in the government, Parliament, and party dynamics. The competition among a limited group of individuals for this utmost of self-enriching positions is what shapes the future of Britain, with public and judicial influence perceived as secondary in this context.
The historical and contemporary nature of how the Westminster Parliament defines the borders of its control and exercises power over those areas has often involved extensive violence and dehumanisation externally, the mass accumulation of land, rights and opportunities internally, and extreme militarisation, repression, concentrated warfare and surveillance,. Cf. colonisation of Ireland, enclosure, the English-British empire.
This situation implies that any future government is likely to lead a Parliament that does not aim to distance itself from the legacies of its predecessors. Instead, we can expect the further entrenchment of border violence and the increasingly creative, destructive, and callous leadership for the objective of shaping Britain into an internal fortress, completely militarised both within and without.
There is nothing to fix. All this simply focuses a lens on what many of us have instinctively concluded. This is not a broken system, but one that is in fact extremely effective at meeting its goals – undermining democracy, personal enrichment, and keeping Britain fascist.
The history of how Parliament, Party, and Prime Minister emerged as three levers of British power, and the consequences for when they are concentrated or attempted to be, shines a light on how our situation is not new.
What do you think about all this? What would you like to learn on these topics? Let us know in the comments.
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