The Home Office has quietly published a top official’s warning that Priti Patel ’s plan to force refugees to Rwanda could end up wasting taxpayer cash.
The Home Secretary issued a rare last-minute ‘ministerial direction’ to force the scheme to go ahead - after her Permanent Secretary warned he could not allow it without her written order.
Matthew Rycroft said while he was satisfied “it is regular, proper and feasible for this policy to proceed”, he could not guarantee it would sufficiently deter people from making dangerous Channel crossings to provide value for money.
The intervention is a major one because 'ministerial directions' are rare - and it appears to undermine Boris Johnson's justification for the plan.
The PM had argued it would deter people from crossing the Channel in small boats, saying: “I believe this plan is the right way forward because the people smugglers must be stopped in order to save countless lives".
After days of not formally confirming whether it existed, the Home Office published the direction online without fanfare at 5.25pm on Saturday, midway through a four-day bank holiday weekend.
Mr Rycroft raised the concern under the Treasury’s Managing Public Money rules - which say as an ”accounting officer” he must “use resources efficiently, economically and effectively, avoiding waste and extravagance”.
Under the plan, anyone who arrived “illegally” in the UK under a new crackdown - such as on a Channel dinghy or stowed in a fridge truck - can be deemed “inadmissible” to claim asylum in Britain.
The UK will then detain them before forcing them onto a charter flight nearly 5,000 miles away to Rwanda, and telling them to make an asylum claim there instead.
Priti Patel said on Thursday there was a £120m “initial” cost but this does not include many aspects of the plan. Critics say an “offshoring” scheme run by Australia ran into billions of pounds.
Mr Rycroft warned there was a “high” cost and “uncertainty surrounding the value for money of the proposal”.
He said it would only provide value for money if it is “effective as a deterrent” to people getting into traffickers’ dangerous Channel dinghies.
He added: “Evidence of a deterrent effect is highly uncertain.
“And [it] cannot be quantified with sufficient certainty to provide me with the necessary level of assurance over value for money.
“I do not believe sufficient evidence can be obtained to demonstrate that the policy will have a deterrent effect significant enough to make the policy value for money.
“This does not mean that the [Rwanda plan] cannot have the appropriate deterrent effect; just that it there is not sufficient evidence for me to conclude that it will.
“Therefore, I will require your written instruction to proceed. I consider it is entirely appropriate for you to make a judgement to proceed in the light of the illegal migration challenge the country is facing.
“I will of course follow this direction and ensure the Department continues to support the implementation of the policy to the very best of our abilities.”
The document was revealed today as Priti Patel claimed human rights lawyers are the “opponents of what British people want”.
In a hardline attack, the Home Secretary told the Sun on Sunday there was “synthetic outrage” and a “typical hysterical reaction from the Left” about her plan.
Attacking lawyers who win cases against removing people from Britain, she said: “People traffickers are profiteering from illegal migration but a lot of law firms do the same.
“They're campaigning against the removal of people with no legal right to be in our country and are effectively the opponents of what British people want.”
In her response on Wednesday - hours before the scheme was announced - Priti Patel ordered the scheme to go ahead.
She said: “I recognise your assessment on the immediate value for money aspect of this proposal. However, I note that without action, costs will continue to rise, lives will continue to be lost, and that together we have introduced safeguards into our agreement to protect taxpayer funding.”
She added: “It would therefore be imprudent in my view, as Home Secretary, to allow the absence of quantifiable and dynamic modelling - which is inevitable when developing a response to global crises influenced by so many geopolitical factors such as climate change, war and conflict - to delay delivery of a policy that we believe will reduce illegal migration, save lives, and ultimately break the business model of the smuggling gangs.”
It came as the Archbishop of Canterbury warned Boris Johnson ’s plan to force Britain’s unwanted asylum seekers to Rwanda is “opposite to the nature of God”.
Justin Welby was due to use his Easter sermon to deliver a devastating rebuke to the Prime Minister’s plan to send people who arrive on Channel boats on a one-way flight.
In a speech on Thursday the PM vowed to stop desperate refugees “jumping the queue”, adding: “I know there will be a vocal minority who will think these measures are draconian and lacking in compassion. I simply don’t agree.”
But in his high-profile address at Canterbury Cathedral, the Archbishop was due to say the measures "cannot carry the weight of our national responsibility as a country formed by Christian values".
“Sub-contracting out our responsibilities, even to a country that seeks to do well, like Rwanda, is the opposite of the nature of God who himself took responsibility for our failures,” he added.
Once in Rwanda people will be put up in a hostel called Hope House in the capital.
But the Sunday Mirror revealed grown-up orphans of the 1994 Rwandan genocide will lose their home to make way for refugees being booted out of Britain.
Some 22 residents are being turfed out of Hope House hostel to make room for asylum seekers sent to the African country under the proposed scheme.
Boris Johnson wants to send the first flight by the end of May but has accepted the scheme - which critics say is a distraction from Partygate to gain attention in the local elections - will be fought in the courts.
Women, LGBT+ people and refugees from Rwanda itself could all be sent to the country under the scheme.
But more than 200 people from Rwanda itself applied for UK asylum in the last decade, and since 2017 20 were granted some form of leave to remain.
The UN Refugee Agency opposed the plans and Robina Qureshi, director of the refugee homelessness charity Positive Action in Housing, said: "The refugee policy of this country should be clear by now. It's not about saving refugees' skins, it's about saving this Government's skin."
Most Conservative MPs have backed the plans, claiming the small boats issue is important to constituents.
But former child refugee and Labour peer Alf Dubs said ministers would face opposition in the Lords. In an interview with The Guardian, Lord Dubs said the Government was attempting to "ride roughshod" over international agreements.
He said: "I think it's a way of getting rid of people the Government doesn't want, dumping them in a distant African country, and they'll have no chance of getting out of there again.
"I think it's a breach of the 1951 Geneva conventions on refugees. You can't just shunt them around like unwanted people."
