A policing minister has said she understands it “sticks in the throat” that migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu was given £500 after threatening to disrupt his deportation flight but insisted it was “the right thing to do”.
“So it sticks in the throat, right? I get that. It does for me. It does for most people,” Sarah Jones told Sky News.
She added: “We do not spend taxpayers’ money on military planes or private planes. We put these offenders on normal flights with normal people going on holiday or going to visit their relatives.
“We have to make sure that’s done in a safe way, which is why he had people with him. But if he was to choose to kick off on a plane, we’d have to take him off that plane, because that plane is not our plane.”
Removing him and taking him back into custody would have cost “£10,000 at least”, which is why the choice was made that it was “better to get him out of our country”.
“And that was the choice, galling, though that is … I hope people understand that that was the choice they faced, and that was the right thing to do.”
Jones said giving cash to people to get them out of the country was not “a new thing” after it emerged that migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu was given £500.
It would have cost thousands of pounds to rebook flights and have him escorted again by five people, she told LBC.
“So the choice was £500 versus £10,000 and I think in terms of use of taxpayers’ money, that was the right decision to make,” she said.
She could not say why Kebatu needed five escorts.
“He’s obviously a nasty criminal. We wanted out of the country, and we wanted to make sure he left,” she said.
She later added: “I think there has always been a system where some payments are sometimes made in order to get people on the planes and get them out of the country. I don’t think that is a new thing.”
She said she expected an inquiry launched by David Lammy on how Kebatu was mistakenly released from prison would report back “within a few months max”.
