Sunak pressures Lords to pass Rwanda bill and denies Tory fractures on issue

PM urges Labour peers to back bill after it passes Commons despite rebellions, amid reports of Tory MPs submitting no-confidence letters

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Rishi Sunak has urged the House of Lords to swiftly pass his controversial Rwanda deportation bill, claiming it was “the will of the people” and insisting the Conservative party was completely united on the issue despite this week’s mass rebellions.

In a hastily arranged Downing Street press conference after the bill, which unilaterally declares Rwanda a safe country to which to deport asylum seekers, passed its third reading in the Commons, Sunak said it was now up to peers to fall in line.