New UK Prime Minister Starmer says controversial Rwanda deportation plan is 'dead and buried'
Keir Starmer said Saturday that he is scrapping his predecessor's controversial policy to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda as he vowed to deliver on voters' mandate for change, though he warned it will not happen quickly.
«The Rwanda scheme was dead and buried before it started,» Starmer said in his first news conference since the Labour Party swept Conservatives from power after 14 years. «It's never acted as a deterrent. Almost the opposite.»
Starmer told reporters in a wood-paneled room at 10 Downing St. that he was «restless for change,» but would not commit to how soon Britons would feel improvements in their standards of living or public services.
The 30-minute question-and-answer session followed his first Cabinet meeting as his new government takes on the massive challenge of fixing a heap of domestic woes and winning over a public weary from years of austerity, political chaos and a battered economy.
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«We have a huge amount of work to do, so now we get on with our work,» Starmer told them.
UK immigration: Will Starmer make it more difficult for you to move to Britain?
Starmer's Cabinet features a record number of women — 11 of 25 ministers. Nearly all members went to public schools, another record that is a sharp break from Conservative ministers who have historically come with private school pedigrees.
«I'm proud of the fact that we have people around the Cabinet table who didn't have the easiest of starts in life,»
