Boris Johnson said lawyers were ‘abetting the work of criminal gangs’
Downing Street has condemned death threats sent to lawyers following last-ditch court hearings that took place ahead of the first flight sending asylum seekers to Rwanda.
On Thursday, a spokesperson for Boris Johnson said: “I think the Prime Minister is certainly of the view that all those in our legal profession whether it’s lawyers solicitors, barristers, judges play a vital role in our democracy.
“Any abuse or harassment is utterly unacceptable.”
It comes after Johnson suggested on Tuesday that lawyers were “abetting the work of criminal gangs” by representing the asylum seekers being flown to Rwanda.
Earlier in the day, at a Cabinet meeting, Johnson said: “They are, I’m afraid, undermining everything that we’re trying to do to support safe and legal routes for people to come to the UK and to oppose the illegal and dangerous routes.”
He said what the “criminal gangs are doing and what … those who effectively are abetting the work of the criminal gangs are doing, is undermining people’s confidence in the safe and legal system, undermining people’s general acceptance of immigration”.
Speaking later during a visit to Staffordshire, the Prime Minister said lawyers were “very good at picking up ways of trying to stop the Government from upholding what we think is a sensible law.”
He added: “Will it be necessary to change some laws to help us as we go along? It may very well be and all these options are under constant review.”
The comments sparked a wave of criticism online, with some lawyers reporting they had received death threats.
Similar comments have been levied by other members of the cabinet in the wake of lawyers preventing deportations.
In September 2020, after the Home Office was unable to stop asylum seekers crossing the English Channel by boat, the Home Secretary Priti Patel said the problem was that “removals continue to be frustrated by activist lawyers”.
Johnson himself made an almost identical comment in July 2021, when asked asked to respond to comments by Labour party leader Sir Keir Starmer that the Conservatives had become the party of crime and disorder.
He told LBC’s Nick Ferrari that “the Labour opposition has consistently taken the side of, I’m afraid, left-wing criminal justice lawyers against, I believe, the interests of the public.”
On Tuesday, the first flight scheduled to take migrants to Rwanda has not been able to depart, following an injunction by the European Court of Human Rights.
Having been issued a last-minute injunction on behalf of an Iraqi asylum seeker, the number of asylum seekers eligible for deportation was reduced to zero, meaning the flight was unable to take off.
Patel has said preparations for the next flight are now taking place.
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