The British Home Office has not denied reports of plans to send asylum-seekers to off-shore processing centres in the east African nation of Rwanda.
The Times reported on Tuesday that Prime Minister Boris Johnson would soon announce plans to "outsource" processing.
The anonymous sources quoted by the newspaper said Johnson had planned to reveal the scheme last week in response to soaring numbers of illegal immigrants being trafficked across the English Channel from mainland Europe.
But they claimed the PM “wobbled” after colleagues feared preparations were incomplete.
“He wanted to go ahead with it but it’s just not ready,” a government source told The Times. “It’s close but there are still a lot of things in the balance.”
Responding to questions about the report, a Home Office spokesperson did not confirm or deny the claims.
"As set out in our New Plan for Immigration, we are committed to working closely with a range of international partners as we continue to fix our broken asylum system," the spokesperson told Sky News.
Several backbench MPs from the ruling Conservative Party have criticised the concept of "off-shoring" the rising number of claimants. David Davis, Andrew Mitchell and Simon Hoare tabled an amendment to the Nationality and Borders Bill currently in Parliament against the practice, but were defeated.
Davis said the move would create "a British Guantanamo Bay" and would be a "moral, economic and practical failure," while Mitchell suggested it would cost more than housing immigrants at London's swanky Ritz hotel.
The report was not the first to claim the UK is planning to imitate Australia's controversial policy of sending asylum-seekers to detention and processing centres in other countries.
Last November, Albanian Foreign Minister Olta Xhacka denied Times journalist Tom Newton-Dunn's claim that her country would play host to some of those claiming asylum in Britain. Newton-Dunn even managed to mis-identify Xhacka as a man.