Theresa May and around a dozen Conservatives MPs are set to stage a final rebellion against Rishi Sunak’s government over plans to deny migrants modern slavery protections in the small boats crackdown.
Tory moderates are still hoping to win concessions on modern slavery, child detention and the creation of new legal refugee routes to ease the impact of the Illegal Migration Bill – condemned by campaigners as a “draconian”.
After accepting some minor changes from the Lords earlier this month, immigration minister Robert Jenrick has vowed that there will be no further climbdowns as Mr Sunak pushes to get the bill into law before parliament’s summer recess.
Ms May and others are expected to vote against the government on Monday evening as the bill is enters the final stages of “ping pong” between the Commons and the Lords.
The former prime minister has warned that if a Lords amendment to the illegal immigration bill is overthrown it would “consign more people to slavery – no doubt about it”.
One senior Tory rebel told The Independent: “We would hope the government are going to have to give us something.”
Ms May has argued that people brought to the UK in slavery should be exempt, under the Modern Slavery Act, from the planned detention regardless of their immigration status. She said it would it “harder to catch” people traffickers but preventing them from giving evidence.
The Lords inflicted a string of fresh defeats on the government last week over the much-criticised bill, which Mr Sunak and his home secretary Suella Braverman insist is integral to efforts to tackle small boats crossings in the Channel.
The bill is part of a package of measures designed to deter migrants by making it clear that if people enter the UK by irregular means, they will not be able to remain and will face being sent either to their home country or a third country such as Rwanda.
The government did make some changes to the legislation – agreeing that unaccompanied children cannot be detained any longer than eight days rather than the proposed 28. Ms Braverman also agreed to keep the current limit of 72 hours on the detention of pregnant women.
But the Commons later overturned a raft of amendments by the unelected chamber, and Mr Jenrick has vowed to stand firm and push the legislation through as it stands. He said critics of the bill had not put forward any “credible alternative”.
While the Lords is unlikely to refuse to pass the bill before summer recess starts on Thursday, senior peers vowed to be “stubborn” in the parliamentary showdown over the next few days.
Lord Newby, the Liberal Democrats leader in the Lords, told The Independent: “We know they’re determined to get it through before summer – but we can be stubborn and keep sending it back. My colleagues are up for a fight on this.”
A “nuclear option” for the government if the Lords refused to back down is to use the Parliament Act and force the bill through. But Labour and Lib Dem sources said it would not come to that.
Despite the expectation Mr Sunak will get the bill through, the deal to send migrants on a one-way trip to Rwanda has been mired in legal difficulties and will end up in the Supreme Court.
With a backlog of asylum cases in the UK, the government is also seeking to cut the cost of hotel bills by using alternative accommodation including the Bibby Stockholm and former military bases.
The barge was due to arrive in Portland Port in Dorset on Monday, where it will house around 500 asylum seekers arriving from across the Channel on small boats. Dorset Council has been given a £2m funding package to meet the cost of providing services.
But No 10 insisted the plan would prove value for money, with Rishi Sunak’s official spokesman saying on Monday that the barges and bases would “save the taxpayer money compared to spending on hotels”.
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper suggested that giant barges and disused military bases could continue to be used by a Labour government.
She refused to rule out use of controversial offshore accommodation – criticised by refugee groups and campaigners as akin to “prison ships” – but insisted Labour’s priority would be to clear the asylum backlog so that such accommodation was not needed.
It came as comedian Dom Joly, dressed as Mickey Mouse and holding a placard saying “stop child detention”, led a Save the Children protest against the Bill outside the Home Office in central London.
The protest followed ministers facing criticism over a decision to paint over murals of Disney characters, including Mickey Mouse and Baloo from The Jungle Book, at a migrant reception centre in Kent.