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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Saturday confirmed his newly formed government would not pursue his predecessor’s policy to deport asylum seekers who arrive in small boats to Rwanda, ending the scheme before any flights took off.
Starmer had earlier promised to scrap the Conservative’s policy of sending asylum seekers to Rwanda, but with migration a key electoral issue, he will be under pressure himself to find a way to stop tens of thousands of people arriving across the Channel from France on small boats.
”The Rwanda scheme was dead and buried before it started. It’s never been a deterrent (to small boat crossings),” Starmer said at a press conference.
”I’m not prepared to continue with gimmicks that don’t act as a deterrent.”
The news conference followed his first Cabinet meeting as the new government takes on the massive challenge of fixing a heap of domestic woes and winning over a public weary from years of austerity, political chaos and a battered economy.
The UK has its first change in government in 14 years after the Labour Party won a landslide victory early Friday in a general election that saw the Conservative Party suffer its biggest defeat ever. Labours have secured 412 of the 650 parliamentary seats, while the Conservatives were reduced to 121.
Starmer welcomed the new ministers around the table at 10 Downing St., saying it had been the honour of his life to be asked by King Charles III to form a government in a ceremony that officially elevated him to the prime minister.
“We have a huge amount of work to do, so now we get on with our work,” he said.
In his first speech, he said he would lead a “government of service” on a mission of national renewal in his first official remarks Friday. Starmer acknowledged in his first speech outside 10 Downing St. that many people are disillusioned and cynical about politics, but said his government would try to restore faith in government.
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