A Tory shadow minister has said judges should not be “interpreting what the meaning of a law is.”
This week, a UK judge ruled that a Palestinian family of six should be able to move to the UK under the Ukraine Family Scheme.
This was an initiative set up in March 2022 to allow Ukrainians fleeing the war with Russia to move to the UK if they had a relative who was a British citizen or had settled status.
Although the scheme ended last year, upper tribunal judge Hugo Norton-Taylor decided a Palestinian family of six had the right to come to the UK under the scheme.
The case had been contested by the Home Office, and the decision has also angered Tory ministers.
This includes shadow housing minister Paul Holmes, who spoke to TalkTV about the case on Wednesday morning.
He said: “The government has a right to say to judges: ‘Look we’ve set up these schemes, these are the ways the letter of the law should be followed, it’s not for you to start interpreting what the meaning of that law is.'”
If judges shouldn’t be interpreting the meaning of laws, then it does beg the question what their role is then?
Of course, the Conservatives have a history of not liking the decisions of judges.
After the Supreme Court had ruled the disastrous Rwanda policy was unlawful, Rishi Sunak’s government simply decided to pass a bill stating Rwanda is a safe country.
Related: Tory peer tells Ukraine to ‘accept’ their occupied land belongs to Russia