In full: Yvette Cooper says £700m spent on Rwanda scheme ‘shocking waste of taxpayer’s money’

The Rwanda scheme has already cost £700 million, it has emerged, as the Home Secretary called the policy “the most shocking waste of taxpayer’s money I have ever seen”. Yvette Cooper told the Commons that she had informed the Rwandan Government that the British Government would be ending the Migration and Economic Development Partnership deal, which would have seen asylum seekers sent to the central African country. She added that the previous government had planned to spend more than £10 billion on the scheme. Ms Cooper said: “I can report it has already cost the British taxpayer £700 million in order to send just four volunteers. “Those costs include £290 million payments to Rwanda, chartering flights that never took off, detaining hundreds of people and then releasing them and paying for more than 1000 civil servants to work on the scheme.” She added: “A scheme to send four people. It is the most shocking waste of taxpayers’ money I have ever seen.”