SEE YOU IN COURT, PM WARNED ON SMALL BOATS PLAN

>> GOVERNMENT FACES LEGAL BATTLE AS CRITICS SAY MIGRANT SCHEME IS BREACH OF INTERNATIONAL LAW

- Nicholas Cecil

MINISTERS were heading for a Supreme Court showdown over the Government's flagship new immigration law which was today branded "unworkable, nasty, and costly".

Legal experts warned that charities, campaign groups or individuals would inevitably bring legal challenges against the plan being unveiled by Suella Braverman.

The Home Secretary said the Government "had pushed the boundaries of international law" to try to solve the crisis of thousands of people risking their lives by seeking to cross the Channel in overcrowded, often unseaworthy small boats to reach Britain and claim asylum. But Stephanie Harrison KC, a barrister specialising in asylum and immigration law, said: "It's bound to end up in the courts because it is not stretching international law, it's breaching international law."

Ms Braverman was publishing details of the Illegal Migration Bill at lunchtime today which aims to allow adults who arrive by small boat to be detained, denied asylum, sent to their home country, or to a third "safe" nation such as Rwanda, and banned for life from returning to Britain. They will not be able to use modern slavery laws if they come to the UK illegally. The Government is pledging to open up more safe and legal routes to claim asylum in Britain but will cap the number of successful applicants. Unaccompanied children will not be removed from Britain under the crackdown until they are at least 18.