New U.K. Prime Minister Starmer says controversial Rwanda deportation plan is "dead and buried"

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Saturday on his first full day in office that he is scrapping a controversial Conservative policy to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda as he vowed to get change in motion, though he warned it will take time.

"The Rwanda scheme was dead and buried before it started," Starmer said in his first news conference. "It's never acted as a deterrent. Almost the opposite."

The announcement was widely expected because Starmer said he would ditch the plan that has cost hundreds of millions of dollars but never taken flight.