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Photo by UK Parliament on Wikimedia commons.
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UK Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, the Right Honourable Robert Buckland QC, has blasted UK immigration lawyers who ‘deliberately delay’ immigration cases by filing last-minute human rights claims. During an interview with the Daily Mail, Buckland accused immigration lawyers of ‘taking the British public for a ride.’
Buckland referred to a number of instances where immigration lawyers lodged legal challenges, including a controversial deportation flight set to return several criminals to Jamaica in December 2020.
This flight in particular saw a host of celebrities rally, including model Naomi Campbell and actress Thandie Newton, to stop the deportations and comparing the criminals on board with victims of the Windrush scandal.
Deeply offensive
The comparison was described by Home Secretary, Priti Patel, as deeply offensive. Meanwhile, Mr Buckland said that the lodging of last-minute legal challenges ‘breaks his heart’. He said: “It breaks my heart to see that laws designed to protect the vulnerable are being abused in undeserving UK immigration cases.”
“What I think has gone wrong is that the process has become very, very lengthy and, frankly, sometimes deliberately elongated in order to buy people more time in the country. That, to me, isn’t a proper reflection of due process.
“That’s why both the Home Secretary and I are very anxious to make sure that we can strip out unnecessary procedures while preserving the rights of the applicant and the interests of justice,” Buckland added.
The Justice Secretary argued that the British public doesn’t like being ‘taken for a ride’ by lawyers who keep coming up with new grounds on which to launch an appeal.
Activist lawyers
Buckland’s reprimand has reignited comments made by Priti Patel in the autumn of 2020, when she said ‘activist lawyers’ were frustrating the process of removing Channel migrants. However, at the time, Buckland had stepped in to ask the Home Secretary to ‘tone down her rhetoric’.
The much publicised Jamaican deportation case involved the removal of 23 nationals of Jamaica who had been convicted of crimes such as rape and murder. However, they were removed from a Home Office charter flight as immigration lawyers lodged claims that included an allegation of the criminals being victims of modern slavery.
Commenting on the Jamaican deportation flight, Mr Buckland said: “The modern slavery laws are such an important, ground-breaking piece of legislation. It breaks my heart to think it might be potentially open to abuse by people just because they want to launch another argument to buy them more time.”
“This country has a great reputation of being a safe haven for people of all faiths and sexualities, from the Huguenots through to the Kindertransport. I’m proud of that,” Buckland added.
The Justice Secretary did confirm plans to restrict the use of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights – banning torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment - which is often used by foreign national criminals looking to avoid deportation.
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