Tory right revives Brexit-style scrutiny of its own government over Rwanda
When two tribes go to war… it spells trouble for Rishi Sunak.
Within hours of Home Secretary James Cleverly signing his new Rwanda treaty, the hard men of the Tory right and the gentlemen on the left of the party squared up to each other.
It was at the very moment when the treaty was published on the government website, just before 5pm, that right-wing Tory MPs gathered in Committee Room 11 in the Commons to plot their response.
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At the same time, as Big Ben could be heard striking 5pm, the moderate One National Caucus, which claims 106 Conservative MPs are members, issued a plea to the prime minister: Don’t dump human rights laws.
Packed into Committee Room 11 were members of three Tory right-wing factions, the European Research Group, the Common Sense Group and the New Conservatives. Yes, the right is indeed split into three factions.
After more than an hour, while a party of teachers and bemused schoolchildren with a 6pm booking for the room waited patiently in the corridor, the council of war ended after the MPs reached a highly significant decision.
Hardliners Mark Francois, who chairs the European Research Group, former Brexit minister David Jones and Lawrence Robertson, the socially conservative pro-Brexit horse racing aficionado, strode downstairs to the Central Lobby.
There, live on Sky News, Mr Francois announced a move that will be seen as holding Mr Sunak‘s feet to the fire: detailed scrutiny of the government’s Rwanda Bill by a “Star Chamber” chaired by the veteran Euro-sceptic MP Sir Bill Cash.
Sound familiar? Correct. Back in 2020 Sir Bill and his panel of lawyers carried out a similar exercise examining Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal. Then, surprise, surprise, they gave it the thumbs up. But it’s by no means certain they’ll reach the same conclusion this time.
After all, the right-wing hardliners want the bill to consign to the dustbin the jurisdiction over the Rwanda plan of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act introduced by Tony Blair’s government in 1998.
The One Nation Caucus, meanwhile, issued a statement at 5pm claiming the government can reduce migration – legal and illegal – without undermining the European Court of Human Rights. Hah! The Tory Right will never accept that.
Using the now-familiar milk analogy favoured by Conservative MPs, One Nation spokesman Stephen Hammond, MP for the leafy south London constituency of Wimbledon where 70% of voters backed Remain in 2016, declared: “Moderates and mainstream Conservatives may struggle to support a so-called full-fat deal.”
And grandee Damian Green said: “We have set the standards on what a law-abiding, well-functioning democracy should look like. Successive Conservative governments have played a vital role in creating and protecting the ECHR as well as the refugee and torture conventions.”
So what does all this infighting between the two Tory tribes mean for the prime minister as he attempts to rush his Rwanda Bill through Parliament? It means it’s likely to slow things down and lead to more allegations of delay and dither.
A very senior Tory MP told Sky News the government had hoped to publish the bill on Wednesday, with a first reading after Prime Minister’s Questions, but ministers missed the deadline for getting it on the order paper.
The plan then was to hold the second reading debate in the Commons on Thursday. Tory MPs – and Labour – were put on a three-line whip, very rare for a Thursday. Now, however, they’ve been stood down and it’s back to the previously scheduled private business.
But the rebels – including Mr Francois and his comrades – told government whips they “wanted the weekend” to study the bill. Or, rather, give it to Sir Bill Cash and his legal eagles to study.
Another delaying factor is that the Tory high command has suddenly got the jitters after two big rebellions, on inflected blood and climate change, on Monday night.
The list of rebels on climate change read like a roll call of the Tory Right – including Braverman, Cash, Cates, IDS, Gullis, Hayes, Jenkyns, Patel, Redwood and Rees-Mogg – and the same MPs that could potentially sink the Rwanda policy.
The likeliest outcome is now that the bill will be published on Thursday, with a second reading pencilled in for next week. And then the fun – the bruising parliamentary battle – really starts.
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The lyrics of the Frankie Goes to Hollywood song that begins with “When two tribes go to war…” continue with “a point is all that you can score.”
But a draw in the battle over Rwanda with rebel Tory MPs is no good to Rishi Sunak. With the stakes so high, nothing less than an emphatic victory over his warring tribes will do.