Dozens of Tory MPs have failed to back Rishi Sunak’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
In a sign of trouble ahead for the prime minister, 44 of his own backbenchers refused to vote for the Illegal Migration Bill in the Commons last night.
Former prime minister Theresa May - who earlier launched a bitter attack on the draft legislation - was among the rebels.
She said “genuine victims of modern slavery will be denied support” under the new law.
Former immigration minister Caroline Nokes, who has described the bill as “an absolute horror”, was another rebel.
The bill passed the second reading stage of its parliamentary journey by 312 votes to 250.
Former justice secretary Robert Buckland said “a lot” of Tory MPs who voted with the government last night will not do so in future unless it is radically amended to prevent unaccompanied children being deported or families being split up.
Buckland also said the bill will fail in its bid to stop small boats crossing the Channel unless it is redrawn.
He told Radio Four’s Today programme: “I think Theresa May’s contribution yesterday was significant and powerful. She was somebody who ran the Home Office for six years and has immense experience of this.
“I think a lot of us who decided to allow the principle of the bill to go forward yesterday were doing so upon the basis that this bill will need further work of it is to have the effect that the government wish it to have, namely to end the small boats crisis.”
He added: “I do not support the detention of unaccompanied children or indeed the splitting up of families, that was a government policy that has been followed since 2010 and I think that those parts of the bill should be removed.”
Buckland said those measures meant the government “risks looking as if it is guilty of ineffective authoritarianism”.
“The government risks looking as if it is guilty of ineffective authoritarianism.”
Asked if the bill will stop the small boats, Buckland said: “I think that on its own it won’t. I think that international action is going to be essential if we are to make headway here.”
Bpeaking in America, Sunak defended the bill. He said: “I’m confident that our bill represents the best way to grip this problem.
“I’ve also always been clear that there is no … one simple solution to what is a complicated problem. It will take lots of different interventions.”