by | Dec 5, 2023 | The Guardian
This malign deportation scheme is a distraction from years of broken pledges
wasn’t sacked from her post as home secretary three weeks ago because of her zeal in promoting the deportation of asylum seekers to Rwanda – a policy she once described as her “dream”. It was an intemperate attack she made on the police in the Times that led to her dismissal by the prime minister she had defied in making it. But anyone who thought – or hoped – that her
would bring an end to this vicious, wrong-headed policy was mistaken. Rishi Sunak’s government remains wedded to its project of sending asylum seekers from all over the world to central Africa.
To that end, Mr Cleverly travelled to Kigali on Tuesday and signed a
with the Rwandan government. Last month, the UK supreme court ruled that the existing deal, based on a memorandum rather than a treaty, is illegal. A new monitoring committee to oversee the arrangements for detainees, and an appeals system staffed by judges, are designed to answer the court’s objections. In addition, ministers are expected to introduce legislation to the House of Commons. Depending on the formula they adopt, this is likely to declare Rwanda to be a “safe third country”, and remove some legal protections from asylum seekers.
by | Dec 5, 2023 | The Guardian
The fragmentation of the education system into multi-academy trusts has created waste and a lack of accountability, writes Prof Ron Glatter. Plus letters from Penny Perrett, John Martin and Andrew Keeley
Michael Gove did even more severe damage during what Polly Toynbee calls his “thunderous four years” as education secretary than she lays out (
). He created a radical but unsustainable change to the architecture of the system.
There are now 2,500 academy trusts. Many are individual schools, but nearly half of them are organised into chains, so-called “multi-academy trusts”, containing up to around 60 schools. They are all contracted directly to the government via “funding agreements”, their ownership having been decided without public involvement. In addition, a number of schools still operate under the old local authority arrangements.
by | Dec 5, 2023 | The Guardian
The days of predictable voting patterns are gone. But this started long before the 2016 vote
Sky Sports irritates me. Not its coverage, which is great. But its tendency to imply that football only started in 1992, when the Premier League launched. We risk doing something equally misleading when it comes to politics – tracing everything back to Brexit. The reality, as the recent UK in a Changing Europe report
, is somewhat more complex.
None of which is to say that Brexit wasn’t hugely significant. It was – in the language of the British Election Study team – an “
” that affected politics and public opinion in a number of ways.
Anand Menon is director of the UK in a Changing Europe and professor of European politics and foreign affairs at King’s College London
by | Dec 5, 2023 | The Guardian
Robert Jenrick earlier said there could be ‘merits’ to annual cap on net migration and suggested crackdown ‘good for economy’The UK has suffered a sharp
