Aide to UK minister calls Rwanda migrant plan ‘crap’ in leaked audio

AFP | Riyadh, Saudi Arabia  

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

The UK interior minister has defended a parliamentary aide who called the government plan to deport illegal migrants to Rwanda “crap”, in a leaked audio revealed by the BBC yesterday. A controversial law by the Conservative government allowing irregular migrants arriving in the UK to be deported to Rwanda was finally passed in April, after months of parliamentary wrangling.

But in the recording James Sunderland, a parliamentary aide and Conservative party candidate, was heard saying: “the policy is crap, ok? It’s crap.” “But it’s not about the policy. It’s about the effect of the policy”, he went on to say, speaking at a Youth Conservatives conference in April.

“There is no doubt at all that when those first flights take off it will send such a shockwave across the Channel”, Sunderland clarified. Home Secretary James Cleverly said he was “surprised”, when asked about the audio, before saying Sunderland was making a “counterintuitive statement to grab the attention”.

Cleverly told Sky News on Sunday that his aide Sunderland “is completely supportive of the deterrent effect”. Sunderland told the BBC he was “disappointed” to have been recorded at a private event, and said although the policy is “not the be all and end all”, it is “part of a wider response”.