The Home Office has hired an aircraft hangar and aeroplane body to train security staff on how to deport people, as the UK government increases the number of people it forcibly removes each year.
Officials confirmed on Friday the department had increased its capacity to train officials to carry out deportations, including how to handle people who physically resist. Details of the expansion of the programme were first reported by the Times.
The specialist training, which the government has carried out for years, will also be given to staff who deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, as the government pushes ahead with its plan to begin flights to the central African country by the spring.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “Since 2015, the government has had training facilities to ensure escorts can respond professionally to the challenges of removing people with no right to be in the UK. This includes practical sessions so escorts have the skills they need to deal with different scenarios.
“As we ramp up removal activity we will continue to ensure new escorts have the training facilities necessary.”
A government source said the department had recently hired the hangar and fuselage so that staff could practise accompanying people on to planes and learn what to do if they resisted either by fighting back or refusing to move.
It comes as the government steadily increases the number of people it deports after a sharp drop during Covid and as a result of the new returns deal with Albania. In the year to March 2023, Britain forcibly returned 4,193 people, nearly a third more than in the previous 12 months.
The training will also be given to security officials who work on flights to Rwanda, sources confirmed, as ministers continued to push for the first flight to take off in spring.
MPs passed the Rwanda bill this week without amendments, but it faces a two-month period of debate in the Lords before returning to the Commons to consider any further amendments. Rishi Sunak has put the scheme to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda at the heart of his plan to stop small boats crossing the Channel.
The prime minister said on Friday: “In order to fully solve this problem we need to have a deterrent, so that when people come here illegally they won’t be able to stay and will be removed.
“That is why the Rwanda scheme is so important, and that’s why I’m determined to get it through parliament and get it up and running as quickly as possible so we can properly solve this problem.”
