THE Priti Patels of this world often make me regret my atheism. If there was an afterlife, overseen by some great universal judge, then perhaps folk like Patel would get a taste of retribution in the hereafter for their deeds on Earth – because sure as hell there’s no guarantee they’ll be brought to book for their sins in this increasingly Darwinian world they’ve created.

It’s hard to identify a more cruel, malevolent character in public life than Patel. The British Home Secretary seems to delight in inflicting suffering on anyone in a state of misfortune – anyone she deems beneath her; anyone from whom she catches the scent of victimhood. Patel has eclipsed even her own rapacious capacity for sadism, however.

She’s currently considering ‘shipping’ refugees seeking asylum in Britain to Rwanda while their claims are processed. ‘Shipping’ – that’s the word we use now when we discuss the lives of other people. They’re cargo, freight, a package passed around – somehow rendered less than human; something other than you or I. The wicked have a way of torturing language, just as they’ve a way of torturing fellow human beings.

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There’s talks between Patel and the Danish government to set up ‘a joint processing centre’ in Rwanda for refugees seeking asylum in Britain and Denmark. Again, feel the slither of that contrived, dystopian language.

A ‘joint processing centre’ is a prison for refugees. There’s also plans to hold refugees in 'offshore processing centres’. That means sending people to island prisons. That’s what we do now: openly consider dispatching men, women and children, whole families, crying out for our support, to a rock in the middle of the sea. Are they lepers? Should they not be amongst us? Or are we the ones who are unclean, sitting idly by while our government walks a path to hell.

Patel is beyond redemption. But are we also? Does our silent passivity damn us just as badly as Patel actively damns herself? This shameful news has gained little attention. There’s no public uproar, no rage at such a monstrous idea. It’s as if the endless viciousness of the Tory government is steadily corroding our decency. We’ve become enured to their barbarism – and that familiarity is starting to tarnish all our souls. We appear to accept this now.

Recognition must be given to the few who’ve stood up and condemned Patel’s Rwanda plan. Scottish LibDem MP Alistair Carmichael said Patel was concocting “an appalling and inhumane way to treat some of the world’s most vulnerable people”. The SNP’s Stuart McDonald said the scheme was “horrifying” and a possible breach of UN law. Scotland, he said, “wants no part in these inhumane policies”. Amnesty described such moves as “unconscionable”. Labour’s Nick Thomas Symonds denounced the Home Office’s “lack of compassion”.

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Few voices rise in an otherwise quiescent country. This is where we are in 2021: a country which shrugs at the thought of forcing the weakest of the Earth into detention centres in Rwanda, or onto an island in the sea.

There’s dark, churning symbolism beneath this. It’s impossible to hear the word ‘Rwanda’ without thinking of the 1994 genocide, of machetes, of Interahamwe paramilitaries murdering their neighbours at check-points, in churches and in the streets.

Why Rwanda? Why do Britain and Denmark chose that country of all countries? Is there currency, in the minds of people like Patel, to the fear and horror the word ‘Rwanda’ must raise in the hearts of refugees? There’s an unbridled, satanic malignancy in the soul of anyone who’d consider sending refugees – the victims of war and persecution – to a country like Rwanda, still so marked with the memory of genocide.

If empathy remains in this increasingly hollowed out country, can we not think ourselves into the shoes of a fellow human being from the Middle East – fleeing a war that we in the West probably started: you arrive in Britain, desperate for the merest hint of kindness only to learn that you’ll be dispatched to a country which means one thing in your mind, murder.

The Devil himself would be disgraced.

Uncomfortable though it may be, the Rwanda proposal makes it impossible not to consider Patel’s own migrant roots. Her family moved from India to Uganda, and then onto Britain. The Patels were lucky – they left Uganda some years before the forced expulsion of 50,000 Asians during Idi Amin’s murderous dictatorship.

One wonders how Patel can look herself in the mirror given her actions and her family’s history.

This assault on decency by Patel demands a public and powerful response from the Scottish Government. The SNP tells us time and again that the persecution of refugees has no place in Scotland. Well let’s show it, then.

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Immigration may indeed be reserved to Westminster but that doesn’t mean that Nicola Sturgeon cannot offer a home to refugees who may face being ‘shipped’ to Rwanda when the time comes.

Clearly, Patel and her government would refuse such an intercession – that, though, would only add to their shame. Sturgeon must show the courage of her convictions. Publicly denounce Patel and offer the hand of friendship to those in need.

This would not be mere gesture politics. The latest population figures show deaths outweighing births in Scotland. If it wasn’t for migration our population would be in decline. The number of old people is growing, while the number of young and of working age shrinks. That’s a recipe for economic disaster.

Jobs in hospitality cannot be filled at the moment. There’s a staffing crisis even amid pandemic. With casual selfishness, Brexiteer Tim Martin, who runs Wetherspoons pub chain, was recently bleating – with a lack of self-awareness only the profoundly arrogant and stupid can muster – about needing a “more liberal immigration system”. More than 1.3 million overseas nationals left the UK in the past year as Brexit Britain became a cold, unwelcoming place. We need migrants to keep our economy and public services running.

We endlessly hear platitudes that ‘Scotland welcomes refugees’. If we need to, then welcome them for selfish, economic reasons. We don’t have to welcome refugees simply out of the kindness of our hearts. Though, for me, that’s good enough reason alone.

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