Technology Secretary Liz Kendall has asserted that Keir Starmer’s migrant deal with France remains on track, despite a judicial ruling temporarily halted the deportation of an asylum-seeking man.
The minister stated that the last-minute injunction stopping the 25-year-old from being sent to Paris would not undermine the returns scheme in the long term.
Earlier this week, a court official granted a short-term injunction after the unnamed man argued he was a trafficked individual and would face homelessness if returned to France.
Kendall told Times Radio that she would not comment on specific cases, but reiterated: “It involves one person, and will not weaken the core principle of this deal.”
Legal and Procedural Hurdles
A solicitor acting for asylum seekers criticized the administration’s unplanned and disorganized approach” to choosing individuals for deportation, including cases where children were mistakenly targeted.
Imogen Townley from Wilsons said: “There has been a random and chaotic approach to selecting people coming via small boats.”
She added that children were included in the process despite guidelines state they must be exempted from deportation plans.
Reports suggested that two underage boys were erroneously selected for the scheme previously.
Background of the Agreement
The Home Office last month held many Channel migrants under the scheme, pledging to return them to France “within weeks.”
Initially, deportations were planned on commercial flights from London to Paris during this week, but no one have been returned as of yet.
Officials now confront the possibility of further legal challenges and delays. Sources confirmed that at least five more people were selected for removal this week.
Some critics have drawn parallels the challenges to the previous government’s Rwanda deportation plan, which faced repeated legal obstacles. However, unlike that policy, the present challenges involve individual cases rather than the whole program.
Details of the Deal
Under the agreement, finalized in July by Starmer and Emmanuel Macron, the UK committed to detain Channel claimants and send them back to France. In exchange, France would take in a comparable quantity of asylum seekers with relatives in the UK.
The prime minister said at the time: “This isn’t a silver bullet, but with a joint attempt, fresh approaches and a new level of determination, we can finally turn the tables.”
Recently, Mr Justice Sheldon who issued the short-term block stated that further investigation was needed to look into the man’s claim that he was a possible victim of human trafficking.
Proceedings heard that the man and his mother had travelled to Ethiopia when he was a young child, and that he was later trafficked from there to Libya in 2023.
The applicant said he had afterward traveled via Italy to France, and arrived in the UK by small boat on 12 August after his mother gave £1,000 to smugglers.
Next Steps
French officials has been planning to send asylum seekers to the UK this Saturday as part of the reciprocal deal.
An official representative said: “The first migrants are still due to come in France from the UK this week, and the first to leave from France will begin this weekend.”
