Rishi’s tough immigration policy is the big bazooka he needs to destroy Labour – and its about time he uses it
AFTER barely 100 days in office, Rishi Sunak knows his time is already running out.
He is besieged on all sides over thumbscrew taxes, rampant illegal immigration and tortured relations with Brussels.
He has just 18 months to prepare for a titanic general election which many in his own party have already written off as a lost cause.
And he is under fire from Tory critics, not least die-hard fans of Boris Johnson, the former PM and potential Comeback Kid.
He needs a big bazooka.
Now, after weeks of detailed planning, Rishi is armed and ready for action.
The embattled PM is poised to take on Labour and the immigration lobby, risk battle with the EU and rally support from Tory Brexiteers who are BoJo’s strongest allies.
From the moment he walked into No10, Rishi identified illegal immigration as the acid test for the 2016 referendum vow to “take back control”.
He devoted those 100 days to detailed planning with Home Secretary Suella Braverman.
Under new laws, all migrants who arrive illegally — including the tens of thousands shipped by people smugglers across the Channel — will be barred from claiming asylum or sent elsewhere, including Rwanda.
Attempts by immigration lawyers to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights will cease.
This is a red rag for Labour, the human rights lobby, “Wet” Tories — and the EU, which demands total obedience to cockeyed rulings by unaccountable and often unqualified ECHR judges.
It will also be a challenge to the ECHR itself, which in the past has been reluctant to take on nation states by striking down such primary legislation.
Border Force experts predict illegal numbers will soar by 50 per cent this year, from 45,000 in 2022 to 65,000.
Talent for escapology
So, a nightmare for Labour leader Keir Starmer.
He knows illegal immigration is the key reason millions of Red Wall voters switched from Labour to Tory in 2019.
Supporting the crackdown would split Labour asunder.
Opposing it would forever damn Labour as the party of uncontrolled mass immigration.
Importantly for Rishi Sunak, it would stymie Boris Johnson’s not-so-subtle bid to go from ex-PM to next-PM in one swift move.
It would be foolish to write BoJo off, despite all the historic clutter littering his path.
The “greased piglet” has a talent for escapology matched only by The Great Houdini and a guy called Lazarus.
Flash-in-the-pan PM Liz Truss is also providing covering fire today with calls for a tax-cutting dash for growth.
Boris has resurfaced in bullish form after a brief respite painting pictures of cows.
In what appeared to be a rallying call to supporters, he told ex-Cabinet ally and TalkTV host Nadine Dorries the Tories have everything to play for.
“Let me be very clear, the Conservative Party can certainly win the next election. Yes, absolutely,” he said.
He left others to complete the sentence . . . “with me as Prime Minister.”
Boris is right about one thing.
Despite Labour’s 20-point poll lead, there is little appetite for Labour leader Keir Starmer, who he astutely brands “Old Sir Crasheroonie Snoozefest”.
Labour is said to fear a BoJo comeback.
Despite threats of expulsion from Parliament by spiteful MPs over Partygate, the old rascal is still a virtuoso vote magnet.
But Crasheroonie is also vulnerable to properly-thought-out Tory policies which actually deal with the concerns of millions of frustrated Brexit voters in all parties.
Soggy half-life
Boris Johnson won his stunning 2019 landslide by promising to deliver Brexit, revive the UK as an international trading nation and take back control over our borders.
Instead, after three long years, the best we can claim is a soggy half-life on the edge of Europe, a sluggish economy still part-ruled from Brussels and an open goal to a non-stop armada of criminal asylum cheats.
Now it seems Rishi Sunak is ready to deliver.
Previous UK politicians have been reluctant to meddle with a human rights structure set up by British leader Winston Churchill after World War Two.
But this bastion of humanitarianism has been hijacked by Brussels as a stick to punish Brexit Britain for daring to vote Leave.
Rishi is right to call time.