Rwanda - quite a nice place, perhaps?

[Fab Foodie]

Always needed a passport to show at check in before boarding a ferry to France. This was true before juxtaposed border controls and at a time when the Police de Frontiers office in Calais was shut on Sunday afternoon.

Wouldn't expect to show anything between GB and NI any more than I will be on Cal Mac to Harris in four weeks time.

ROI used to be doable, even by air, with an NHS card as ID but that was before 09-11.

To be fair on current form it's anyones guess whether CalMac will have a ferry running to Harris in 4 weeks time....

 

[glasgowcyclist]

To be fair on current form it's anyones guess whether CalMac will have a ferry running to Harris in 4 weeks time....

You’re falling for unionist propaganda there.

 

[Fab Foodie]

You’re falling for unionist propaganda there.

Nope, just experience...and trying to book one for our own vacation!

 

[glasgowcyclist]

Nope, just experience...and trying to book one for our own vacation!

Are you going direct on the ferry from Skye, or over to Lewis then driving down?

 

[Bromptonaut]

Are you going direct on the ferry from Skye, or over to Lewis then driving down?

From my point of view this year we're out and back via Uig/Tarbert. Messed up last year because the Lochmaddy/Mallaig service was suspended due to Heb Isles being majorly knackered with Lord of the Isles redeployed to fill in.

Hebrides seems OK in the Uig triangle. Loch Seaforth on Ullapool/Stornoway is about 13 cars down on normal capacity due to a failed mezzanine on one side of the vessel. It will remain so for the rest of the summer.

Arran is short of capacity I think due to Caledonian Isles being detained at Lairds in Birkenhead for extensive steel repairs found necessary when on annual overhaul. Delivery/in service date for the first of the hybrid vessels is slipping back further.

 

[Fab Foodie]

OOPS!

This one's is gonna queer the pitch and lead to further mass migration!

26m ago13.39 BST

Court rules Rwanda deportation law should not apply in Northern Ireland because it breaches Good Friday agreement​

A judge has ruled that provisions of the UK’s Illegal Migration Act should be disapplied in Northern Ireland, as they undermine human rights protections guaranteed in the region under post-Brexit arrangements, PA Media reports. PA says:

Mr Justice Humphreys also said aspects of the Act were incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
The post-Brexit Windsor framework jointly agreed by the UK and EU includes a stipulation that there can be no diminution of the rights provisions contained within Northern Ireland’s Good Friday peace agreement of 1998.
The Illegal Migration Act provides new powers for the government to detain and remove asylum seekers it deems to have arrived illegally in the UK. Central to the new laws is the scheme to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.
Mr Justice Humphreys delivered judgment at Belfast high court today in two challenges against the Act that focused on the peace process human rights protections guaranteed by the Windsor framework.
The judge found that several elements of the Act do cause a “significant” diminution of the rights enjoyed by asylum seekers residing in Northern Ireland under the terms of the Good Friday agreement.
“I have found that there is a relevant diminution of right in each of the areas relied upon by the applicants,” he said.
He added: “The applicants’ primary submission therefore succeeds. Each of the statutory provisions under consideration infringes the protection afforded to RSE (Rights, Safeguards and Equality of Opportunity) in the Belfast/Good Friday agreement.”
The judge ruled that the sections of the Act that were the subject of the legal challenges should be “disapplied” in Northern Ireland.
He also declared aspects of the Act incompatible with the ECHR.
One of the cases was taken by the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and the other by a 16-year-old asylum seeker from Iran who is living in Northern Ireland having arrived in the UK as an unaccompanied child.
The boy, who travelled from France by small boat and claimed asylum in July 2023, has said he would be killed or sent to prison if he returned to Iran.
The judge agreed to place a temporary stay on the disapplication ruling until another hearing at the end of May, when the applicants will have an opportunity to respond to the judgment.
Dr Tony McGleenan KC, representing the government, indicated that an appeal may be considered.
“We’ll be taking our instructions on the judgment and the position in terms of any further litigation will become clear, my Lord,” he said.
Outside court, solicitor Sinead Marmion, who represented the teenage Iranian asylum seeker applicant, said the judgment was “hugely significant”.
Marmion said the judgment would prevent the Rwanda scheme applying in Northern Ireland.
“This is a huge thorn in the government’s side and it has completely put a spanner in the works,” she told the PA news agency.
“There’s a huge obstacle in the way of them being able to actually implement that in Northern Ireland now, as it’s been found to be incompatible with the Windsor framework.”