After losing their last-ditch legal battle to block the first airplane bound for Rwanda from departing Britain tomorrow, protesters have imagined scuffling with police.
SOAS Detainee Support and the Solidarity Knows No Border network are thought to have organized the emergency protest outside the Home Office in London on Monday.
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was seen yelling energetically into a megaphone as a large audience gathered at the demonstrations, which began around 5.30pm and swiftly grew.
After protestors were spotted wrestling with cops on Monday evening, the scenario devolved into chaos. No arrests have been made, according to the Met Police.
Following an urgent hearing, three Court of Appeal judges today rejected charities’ appeal against an original refusal to grant an injunction on Friday.
The trip is now quite likely to take place tomorrow, despite the fact that a legal challenge from those expected to be on board is still unresolved, and it is uncertain how many people will really travel.
Around 100 persons were first warned that they were facing deportation as a result of the policy, but that number dropped to 31 on Friday after a wave of lawsuits, and the total is currently in the single digits.
Mr Justice Swift, the judge who declined to halt the flight on Friday, Raza Husain QC said, made mistakes in his handling of the facts provided to him.
Three senior judges dismissed the appeal today during an urgent hearing in London, stating there was no error in his decision.
As word of the failed bid to prevent the Home Office’s policy circulated, Conservative MPs celebrated, while Labour former minister Chris Bryant jokingly shouted: ‘Bloody lefty lawyers’ in the House of Commons.
Individual refugees will still be able to fight their deportation, and a thorough judicial review of the policy is set to take place in July.
Lord Justice Singh, sitting with Lady Justice Simler and Lord Justice Stuart-Smith this afternoon, stated that Mr Justice Swift ‘conducted the balancing exercise properly’ and did not mistake in principle or approach.
‘He examined all the issues and came to a conclusion that he was legitimately entitled to on the evidence before him,’ he continued.
‘As a result, this court cannot intervene in that decision.’
The demonstration, it is believed, was planned before the court’s judgment was made public on Monday afternoon.
The protests outside the Home Office come just days after immigration agents attempting to arrest a Nigerian suspect in Peckham were forced to release him when protestors in Peckham blocked their car and chanted “leave him go.”
Following this afternoon’s raid on an area in Peckham, south east London, protestors encircled the Immigration Enforcement vehicle and even looked to brawl with police.
A separate challenge to the charity Asylum Aid, which had battled to temporarily stop ministers from enforcing the repatriation of ‘any asylum seeker’ to Rwanda, was denied today by a High Court judge.
After hearing the case at a High Court hearing in London, Mr Justice Swift decided against the charity.
Asylum Aid’s application should be dismissed, according to Ms Patel’s lawyers.
Asylum Aid’s legal team, lead by Barrister Charlotte Kilroy QC, requested that Mr Justice Swift issue a ‘urgent interim’ injunction to provide time for the charity’s claim to be properly contested.
She claimed that the asylum seekers who were impacted were being used as “guinea pigs” for a method that had not been thoroughly evaluated.
Mr Justice Swift ruled that the grounds of some of the charity’s arguments were “thin.”
The charity’s lawyers hinted that an appeal will be explored.
According to legal expert Joshua Rozenberg, the Court of Appeal was adamant in its support for High Court judge Mr Justice Swift’s handling of the case.
‘Lord Justice Singh and the two justices with him concluded that he had reviewed the evidence and had made no errors,’ he told Sky News.
‘The Court of Appeal was unwilling to intervene since he had made his judgement.’
Mr Rozenberg added that appeal judges also dismissed campaigners’ claims that asylum seekers sent to Rwanda could be returned to their home countries and persecuted there.
‘That argument didn’t appear to fly before the Court of Appeal, and the judge rejected it down for that reason as well,’ he said.
The Home Office has defended the policy, and Prime Minister David Cameron has stated that the government expected “a lot of teething problems” with the strategy, but that it is vital to combat illicit people-smuggling on both sides of the Channel.