Sunak: my patience has ‘run thin’ over Rwanda and on Monday parliament will ‘sit there and vote until it’s done’
Rishi Sunak has said his patience has “run thin” on his failure to get his Rwanda deportation plans through parliament, and has pledged that the Commons will “sit there and vote until it’s done” on Monday.
At a press conference in London, the prime minister was asked whether, now deportation flights taking off in spring appear to have been ruled out, could he guarantee there would be deportations of asylum seekers in the summer. Sunak said:
On Rwanda, the very simple thing here is that repeatedly, everyone has tried to block us from getting this bill through. And yet again, you saw it this week. You saw Labour peers blocking us again, and that’s enormously frustrating. Everyone’s patience on this has run thin, mine certainly has.
So our intention now is to get this done on Monday. No more prevarication, no more delay. We are going to get this done on Monday, and we will sit there and vote until it’s done.
I think everyone will be able to see that that there’s a clear choice. You’ve got a Conservative government that is doing absolutely everything it can to pass this bill so that after that, as soon as practically possible, we can get flights to leave to Rwanda, so that we can stop the boats. And you’ve got a Labour party that is doing actually everything it can to delay and frustrated us in that aim. I think the British people can see that very clearly.
But we’re not deterred. We’re going to do everything we can to stop the boats. We’re going to get this done on Monday. We don’t want any more prevarication or delay from the Labour party. We’re going get this bill passed, and then we will work to get flights off, so we can build that deterrent, because that is the only way to resolve this issue.
If you care about stopping the boats, you’ve got to have a deterrent. You’ve got to have somewhere that you can send people so that they know if they come here illegally, they won’t get to stay. It’s as simple as that.
Incidentally there is some new Lord Ashcroft polling on the Conservative Home website today that suggests 42% of people oppose the Rwanda plan, with 38% approving of it.
Among people who voted Conservative in 2019, support for the Rwanda plan stands at two-thirds. Of those that opposed it, 38% said they opposed it because it sounds “expensive and impractical”, while 55% said they opposed it because “it sounds like a harsh way to treat people.”
Key events
The Post Office Horizon IT inquiry continues today. Rodric Williams, a senior in-house lawyer at the Post Office, is giving evidence for a second day. Much of the testimony today has been looking through documents and trying to probe why nobody in the business appeared to be understanding that there was remote access into the Horizon system from Fujitsu. Jason Beer KC is questioning and it would be fair to say it has been quite testy. You can watch it here …
Sunak criticised by BMA for ‘hostile rhetoric’ in his ‘sicknote culture’ speech as Labour accuses PM of seeking ‘cheap headlines’
Rishi Sunak has faced criticism from healthcare professionals and been accused by Labour of trying to score “cheap headlines” after the prime minister outlined a plan he said would end “sicknote culture” in the UK.
Speaking in London, Sunak said “We don’t just need to change the sicknote, we need to change the sicknote culture so the default becomes what work you can do – not what you can’t”. He outlines five reforms he said the COnservative government would undertake in the next parliament.
The British Medical Association (BMA) described the prime minister as “pushing a hostile rhetoric”, with a spokesperson saying that “Fit notes are carefully considered before they are written, and a GP will sign their patient off work only if they are not well enough to undertake their duties.
“With a waiting list of 7.5 million – not including for mental health problems – delays to diagnostics, and resulting pressures on GP practices, patients cannot get the treatment they need to be able to return to work.”
Earlier, on BBC Breakfast, Work and Pensions secretary Mel Stride said that he thought GPs were signing people off work unnecessarily, telling viewers “We have 2.8 million people on long term sickness benefits. Part of the journey on to those benefits almost certainly involve visiting a GP and being signed off. We have 11 million fit notes that are signed off every year. And in the case of 94% of those fit notes that are signed off, a box is ticked that says that the person is not capable of any work whatsoever.”
Labour’s shadow housing minister Matthew Pennycook, noting that chanceller Jeremy Hunt had made similar proposals when health secretary, said “This is a policy paper that’s been dusted off from 2017 to get a cheap headline and it won’t tackle the fundamental causes of the problem.”
Pennycook said “There has been a long term rise for many, many years under this government in people who are on long term sickness benefits, either because they can’t get the treatment they need through the NHS, which is on its knees after 14 years of Conservative government, or they are not getting the proper support to get back into work.”
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey described it as “a desperate speech from a prime minister mired in sleaze and scandal”.
Disability equality charity Scope said Sunak’s proposals on changes to personal independence payment (Pips) felt like “a full-on assault on disabled people.”
Sunak said that the current spending on long-term sickness and disability benefits was unsustainable at £69bn, and spending on Pip was forecast to rise by 50% in the next four years.
The BBC is reporting that anti-slavery campaigner Dr Aidan McQuade is returning his honorary OBE (Officer of the British empire) over the Rwanda deportation scheme, saying it is “something which I can no longer, in good conscience, keep.”
In a letter announcing that he had returned the honour, Dr McQuade wrote that the government’s Rwanda policy and Rishi Sunak’s intimation he was prepared to leave the European convention on human rights in order to get it operational “send to the whole world a message that the UK rejects the core bases of human rights and rule of law upon which progress in human dignity, including anti-slavery action has been based for hundreds of years. This can only impede the anti-slavery struggle and embolden other governments who seek to systematically abuse the rights of their subjects and citizens.”
Dr McQuade received the honorary OBE for services to the elimination of slavery in 2017.
Ed Davey has described Rishi Sunak’s appearance touting welfare reform plans this morning as “a desperate speech from a prime minister mired in sleaze and scandal”.
PA Media reports the Liberal Democrat leader said: “Millions of people are stuck on NHS waiting lists, unable to get a GP appointment or struggling to access mental health support.
“Rishi Sunak is attempting to blame the British people for his own government’s failures on the economy and the NHS, and it simply won’t wash.”
Ash James, director of practice and development at the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy, the trade union representing physiotherapists, was also critical, noting “the prime minister should look closer to home for the causes. There are long waiting times for NHS services for musculoskeletal conditions, such as back and neck pain – the second most common reason for sickness absence. Long waits lead to more complex problems and we know that the greater the amount of time someone is off work, the less likely they are ever to return”.
BMA criticises Rishi Sunak for ‘hostile rhetoric’ in his ‘sicknote culture’ speech
The British Medical Association (BMA) has urged Rishi Sunak to avoid using a “hostile rhetoric on sicknote culture” after his welfare reform announcement.
PA Media reports Dr Katie Bramall-Stainer, chair of GPC England, the BMA’s GP committee, said:
Fit notes are carefully considered before they are written, and a GP will sign their patient off work only if they are not well enough to undertake their duties.
We do recognise the health benefits of good work, and that most people do want to work, but when they are unwell, people need access to prompt care.
With a waiting list of 7.5 million – not including for mental health problems – delays to diagnostics, and resulting pressures on GP practices, patients cannot get the treatment they need to be able to return to work.
So rather than pushing a hostile rhetoric on ‘sicknote culture’, perhaps the prime minister should focus on removing what is stopping patients from receiving the physical and mental healthcare they need, which in turn prevents them from going back to work.”
Earlier, on BBC Breakfast, Work and Pensions secretary Mel Stride appeared to say that he thought GPs were signing people off work unnecessarily. [See 9.15 BST]
The prime minister was in London today announcing a raft of reforms that he said a Conservative government would bring in during the next parliament.
The director of strategy at disability equality charity Scope has said that today’s speech by Rishi Sunak about his plans for welfare reform “feels like a full-on assault on disabled people.”
In a statement, James Taylor said:
These proposals are dangerous and risk leaving disabled people destitute. In a cost of living crisis looking to slash disabled people’s income by hitting Pip is a horrific proposal. Calls are pouring into our helpline from concerned disabled people.
Life costs more for disabled people. Threatening to take away the low amount of income Pip provides to disabled people who face £950 a month extra costs isn’t going to solve the problem of economic inactivity. Sanctions and ending claims will only heap more misery on people at the sharp end of our cost of living crisis.
Much of the current record levels of inactivity are because our public services are crumbling, the quality of jobs is poor and the rate of poverty amongst disabled households is growing.
Some economic news here from my colleague Jane Croft
Retail sales in Great Britain unexpectedly stalled in March as consumers cut back on spending because of the cost of living, according to new data.
British retail sales volumes stagnated at 0% in March after an increase of 0.1% in February, according to the Office for National Statistics.
The figures were worse than the 0.3% sales growth expected by economists polled by Reuters as a contraction in food sales and department stores offset higher sales elsewhere.
“Retail sales registered no growth in March. Hardware stores, furniture shops, petrol stations and clothing stores all reported a rise in sales,” said Heather Bovill, an ONS senior statistician.
“However, these gains were offset by falling food sales and in department stores where retailers say higher prices hit trading. Looking at the longer-term picture, across the latest three months retail sales increased after a poor Christmas.”
On an annual basis, sales volumes rose 0.8% over the year to March 2024, weaker than the 1% expected.
The gloomy figures underline the dilemma for the Bank of England over when to start cutting interest rates, as it grapples with the twin threat of weak growth and higher than expected inflation in March.
Read more from Jane Croft here: Retail sales in Great Britain flatline as households continue to feel squeeze
Sunak: my patience has ‘run thin’ over Rwanda and on Monday parliament will ‘sit there and vote until it’s done’
Rishi Sunak has said his patience has “run thin” on his failure to get his Rwanda deportation plans through parliament, and has pledged that the Commons will “sit there and vote until it’s done” on Monday.
At a press conference in London, the prime minister was asked whether, now deportation flights taking off in spring appear to have been ruled out, could he guarantee there would be deportations of asylum seekers in the summer. Sunak said:
On Rwanda, the very simple thing here is that repeatedly, everyone has tried to block us from getting this bill through. And yet again, you saw it this week. You saw Labour peers blocking us again, and that’s enormously frustrating. Everyone’s patience on this has run thin, mine certainly has.
So our intention now is to get this done on Monday. No more prevarication, no more delay. We are going to get this done on Monday, and we will sit there and vote until it’s done.
I think everyone will be able to see that that there’s a clear choice. You’ve got a Conservative government that is doing absolutely everything it can to pass this bill so that after that, as soon as practically possible, we can get flights to leave to Rwanda, so that we can stop the boats. And you’ve got a Labour party that is doing actually everything it can to delay and frustrated us in that aim. I think the British people can see that very clearly.
But we’re not deterred. We’re going to do everything we can to stop the boats. We’re going to get this done on Monday. We don’t want any more prevarication or delay from the Labour party. We’re going get this bill passed, and then we will work to get flights off, so we can build that deterrent, because that is the only way to resolve this issue.
If you care about stopping the boats, you’ve got to have a deterrent. You’ve got to have somewhere that you can send people so that they know if they come here illegally, they won’t get to stay. It’s as simple as that.
Incidentally there is some new Lord Ashcroft polling on the Conservative Home website today that suggests 42% of people oppose the Rwanda plan, with 38% approving of it.
Among people who voted Conservative in 2019, support for the Rwanda plan stands at two-thirds. Of those that opposed it, 38% said they opposed it because it sounds “expensive and impractical”, while 55% said they opposed it because “it sounds like a harsh way to treat people.”
Christopher Hope from GB News has asked Rishi Sunak a question that seemed to be trying to turn this into a generational culture war wedge issue, asking “Is this sicknote culture a generational thing? Are you basically saying that Britain’s got to pull itself together, get back to work, older people to get on with it, and younger people don’t want to.”
Sunak has deflected blaming young people somewhat, instead insisting that he considers the system is “writing them off”, answering:
I just want to be really clear. I’m not in any way saying that mental health isn’t a serious condition. Of course it is. And look, if you’re feeling anxious or depressed of course you should get the support and the treatment that you need to manage your conditions. But that doesn’t mean that we should assume you can’t engage in the world of work
But this point on young people is important. And I said it should worry all of us the biggest proportional increase in the group of people who become economically inactive since the pandemic [is] young people.
I that is a tragedy, right. It’s an enormous waste and loss of human potential. And so as a matter of urgency, we should be wanting to tackle that.
And if you believe very strongly as I do that work is good for people, particularly early in their careers and life, then we must look at reforming this system because how it’s working at the moment, forget about what it’s doing on the money and everything else, and it’s unsustainable and bad for the economy, it is fundamentally letting these people down if we are writing them off, rather than helping them get into work. Because that’s probably one of the most positive things we can do for them.
Rishi Sunak said during his speech that an expected rise in benefits spending is “not sustainable”.
The prime minister said in his speech:
We now spend £69bn on benefits for people of working age with a disability or health condition. That’s more than our entire schools budget, more than our transport budget, more than our policing budget.
And spending on personal independence payments alone is forecast to increase by more than 50% over the next four years. Let me just repeat that. If we do not change, it will increase by more than 50% in just four years. That’s not right, it’s not sustainable.
He added that the Government’s “overall approach is about saying that people with less severe mental health conditions should be expected to engage in the world of work”.
He has now been asked which types of medical professionals might be involved if it isn’t going to be GPs. He said there is a very strong argument for changing the system. “I’ve said if you believe like me, work is a good thing, we’ve got to have a system and a culture that recognises that and encourages it. And the current fitn note system unfortunately, is not delivering that for any of us.”
He said:
Today, we’re publishing our call for evidence, because I’m not saying I’m standing here today as a precise arbiter of what it’s going to look like. But we’re going to ask people’s views, we’re going to try on a range of different things. But I do think that there is an argument for moving away from GPs doing this. There’s a lot of demands on GPS. And it may be that this is better done by other professionals.
Also, GPs have a quite special relationship with their patients and inserting this into it puts them sometimes, when you talk to them, in a difficult position, because they don’t want to damage that relationship with their patient, and it may be harder for them.
While Rishi Sunak’s press conference continues, the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry is also up and running again today. Rodric Williams, a senior in-house lawyer at the Post Office, is giving evidence for a second day. His written testimony can be found here, and Jane Croft and Ben Quinn’s report on yesterday’s oral testimony can be found here. I will be keeping an eye on proceedings throughout the day.
Rishi Sunak is finishing his speech by saying:
Some people no doubt will hear this speech and accuse me of lacking compassion, of not understanding the barriers people face in their everyday lives. But the exact opposite is true.
There is nothing compassionate about leaving a generation of young people to sit alone in the dark before a flickering screen, watching as their dreams slip further from reach every passing day.
And there is nothing fair about expecting taxpayers to support those who could work, but choose not to.
I’m expecting him to take questions from the media after delivering it.