Rwanda is suing the UK for what could be more than £50million after Sir Keir Starmer abandoned the Conservatives’ migrant transport pact with the country. The Prime Minister scrapped the agreement – which would have seen asylum seekers removed from Britain to Kigali, where they would have been housed and could later put their name forward for asylum – as one of his first acts following his victory. Individuals deported from the UK would have been taken initially to Hope Hostel, which proclaimed it was ready to receive them in April 2024.

In total, £290million was paid to Rwanda by Britain before the pact was revoked. It has now been revealed that the African nation filed a “notice of arbitration” in November, with its minister of justice and attorney general, Dr Emmanuel Ugirashebuja, listed as the “representative of the claimants”. The legal action brought by Rwanda is being dealt with at the Permanent Court of Arbitration, based in the Netherlands.

The documents named the Home Office’s director for migration and borders, Dan Hobbs, as a representative, and the department has reportedly instructed Ben Juratowitch of Essex Court Chambers, based in London.

The Rwanda deal was denounced as “wasteful” in Labour’s 2024 general election manifesto. It added that the plan had “already cost hundreds of millions of pounds”, and could “only address fewer than one per cent of the asylum seekers arriving”. “It cannot work,” the document read.

“Chaos in the Channel has been matched by chaos at home. The Conservatives’ unworkable laws have created a ‘perma-backlog’ of tens of thousands of asylum seekers, who are indefinitely staying in hotels costing the taxpayer millions of pounds every week.”