Bibby Stockholm, the accommodation barge chartered by the Home Office to house asylum seekers, is moored off Dorset but remains empty over fire safety concerns. Like the Rwanda refugee deportation scheme, the barge seems to be in a state of almost permanent limbo – a symbol, critics say, of the stasis that has overtaken the government’s migration policy. Even assuming that the barge and the Rwanda scheme become operational, they will be insufficient to stem the flow of irregular migration. Thus it is increasingly unlikely that Rishi Sunak will fulfil his ambitious pledge to “Stop the Boats”. If the prime minister is hoping such culture wars issues will turn around his party’s dismal poll ratings, he is likely to be disappointed.
Why does it matter?
Reputations are at stake. An empty vessel is an unfortunate metaphor for the home secretary, Suella Braverman, whose attempts to stem migration have been remarkably ineffective. Indeed, the barge is such an obvious and embarrassing symbol of failure that it risks discrediting the government more widely. Most obvious and immediately, it seems that the Home Office did not in fact make sure that the Bibby Stockholm was safe for human habitation on the scale envisaged. Warnings from the fire brigades union that the vessel is a “floating Grenfell” have been dismissed by deputy prime minister, Oliver Dowden, as politically motivated. But the objections from the independent Health and Safety Executive were impossible to ignore. The first arrivals onto the vessel might reportedly begin from Monday.
