The Government spent £50million on arranging migrant deportation flights to Rwanda despite none ever taking off, new Home Office figures have revealed.
The eye-watering sum was shown in a new document detailing the £715million total spend on the migration partnership with Kigali, before Labour scrapped the scheme this summer.
The breakdown of costs confirmed that £290million had been paid to Rwanda since 2022 as part of the now-junked ‘migration and economic development partnership’.
It also showed how £95million was spent on detention and reception centres, and £280million on other costs such as developing IT systems and staffing and legal costs.
The £50million sum was spent on the costs of securing flights, escorts, and preparing and securing the airfield for proposed migrant deportations, the document stated.
The Rwanda scheme aimed to send Channel migrants on a one-way ticket to Africa to have their asylum claims processed as part of efforts to stop small boat crossings to Britain.
It was claimed the threat of being sent thousands of miles away from the UK would act as a deterrent to potential migrants thinking of making perilous journeys across the Channel.
But a succession of Tory prime ministers ran into legal blocks on the scheme, which was scrapped by Sir Keir Starmer as soon as he took office after Labour’s general election win.
Former home secretary Priti Patel signed the ‘migration and economic development partnership’ with Rwanda foreign minister Vincent Biruta in April 2022
A group of people are pictured on a small boat near Dunkirk, northern France, in an apparent attempt to cross the Channel to Britain
Speaking in the House of Commons this afternoon, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper claimed the Rwanda plan did not stop a single small boat crossing
The Home Office document confirmed £290million had been paid to Rwanda since 2022 as part of the now-junked ‘migration and economic development partnership’
The Prime Minister declared the plans ‘dead and buried’ and blasted them as a ‘gimmick’, as he refocussed Government efforts on ‘smashing’ the people-smuggling gangs.
No migrants were ever deported to Rwanda under the Tory plans, although four people were removed to the African country under a separate voluntary scheme.
Speaking in the House of Commons this afternoon, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper claimed the Rwanda plan did not stop a single small boat crossing.
‘In the two years the partnership was in place, just four volunteers were sent to Rwanda at a cost of £700 million, that included £290 million paid to the government in Kigali, and almost £300 million in staff, IT and legal costs,’ she told MPs.
‘The result of that massive commitment of time and money was 84,000 people crossed the Channel from the day the deal was signed to the day it was scrapped.
‘This so-called deterrent did not result in a single deportation or stop a single boat crossing the Channel. For the British taxpayer, it was a grotesque waste of money.’
But Tory shadow home secretary Chris Philp accused Ms Cooper of being ‘silent on her own record’ on immigration.
He said: ‘The Home Secretary seems to have a great deal to say about the last government, and rather less to say about her own record since the election.
‘But fortuitously there was a large release of data last week, which gives us an insight into the first five months of her time in office, and having looked at that, I can see why she is so silent on her own record.’
Mr Philp pointed to the number of people coming to the UK on small boats as part of Ms Cooper’s record since Labour took office in July.
He said: ‘It has been 150 days up to yesterday since July 4, and in that time a staggering 20,110 people have made the dangerous, illegal and unnecessary crossing, over 20,000 since this Government was elected.
‘That is an 18 per cent increase on the same 150 days last year, and it is a staggering 64 per cent increase on the 150 days immediately prior to the election.’
He blamed the numbers coming to the UK on small boats on Labour’s scrapping of the Rwanda scheme.
Mr Philp referred to comments by the National Crime Agency, saying: ‘They said no amount of funding or action against people smugglers will end crossing on its own.
‘They went on to say, and I quote, you need an effective removals deterrence. Now the Labour Government, after it was elected, cancelled that deterrent.’