Rwanda bill – latest: Rishi Sunak dealt blow as Lee Anderson joins rebellion ahead of crunch vote

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Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced his support for the rebel amendments to the Rwanda Bill.

Posting on social media site X, the ex-leader of the Conservative party said: “Governments around the world are now trying to imitate the UK Rwanda policy for tackling illegal people trafficking. This bill must be as legally robust as possible – and the right course is to adopt the amendments.”

Cabinet minister Michael Gove has told Times Radio he is “pretty sure” Lee Anderson would keep his role as deputy chairman, despite planning to back rebel amendments on the Rwanda bill.

The Levelling Up Secretary said that Mr Anderson’s concerns about the legislation were addressed by the bill in its current form: “I think the Bill does make sure – it’s one of the toughest pieces of migration legislation to come before the House of Commons if not the toughest – and it makes sure that ministers can quickly and clearly send people to Rwanda because it deals with all of the concerns that the Supreme Court had.”

Amnesty International is urging MPs to vote against the government’s “historically bad” Rwanda Bill when it returns to the Commons today.

Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty International UK’s Chief Executive, said: “This historically bad Bill is yet more evidence that the Government has lost of sight of its obligation to protect the rights of refugees, abide by judicial rulings and uphold the rule of law.

“The Government should respect the Supreme Court ruling and stop all attempts to force courts to ignore Rwanda’s troubling human rights record. Seeking to dictate what the facts are to independent courts is a threat to everyone’s human rights, and to the UK’s global standing.

“It’s totally wrong that the Government is proposing to essentially ‘switch off’ the human rights of refugees because it has found them an inconvenience to a fundamentally flawed policy.

“It’s time for the Government to accept reality that Rwanda is not a safe place to send people seeking asylum and get down to the serious task of fairly and efficiently deciding people’s asylum claims.

“We are urging MPs in the strongest terms to take a stand and vote against this meritless Bill.”

Centrist Tories have warned that any caving to the right wing’s demands would “cause problems” for them.

Former justice secretary Sir Robert Buckland said: “The Government would be best advised not to accept any of the amendments from my colleagues on the right, because the Bill then will cause a problem for us here.”

One Nation chairman Damian Green said: “We want the Government to carry it through unamended.”

Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride appeared to play down concerns about a major rebellion over the Rwanda Bill.

It comes after senior Conservatives Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith said they would back right-wing amendments designed to toughen up the legislation.

The Cabinet minister told LBC: “Let’s see. Bills go through various processes. There are often amendments.

“We all know that there are very few Bills – very, very few Bills – that go through straight and clean and nobody tries to amend them in any way at all.

“What matters is that the Bill progresses in a form that leaves it effective at the end and I’m confident we’re going to do that.”

Mel Stride has said prosecutions in the Horizon scandal may be the “right way to go”, but she cautioned “it’s important that we wait until we see the results from that independent inquiry first”.

Mr Stride told Sky News it “may be” that there are criminal matters but that it’s important there is a “thorough, independent process” to get the right judgments.

Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride has refused to be drawn on whether Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith could keep their party posts if the MPs back the rebel amendments to the Rwanda Bill.

“These aren’t decisions for me,” he told Times Radio.

He said that he “understands why people feel very strongly about this”.