David Lammy has said the UK’s migrant returns deal with France serves as an “immediate deterrent” after two asylum seekers were removed from the country under the scheme, as Channel crossings continued.
The Deputy Prime Minister said the Government hoped to see the number of deportations “grow over the coming months and years” as more small boats began making the dangerous journey in the early hours of Friday.
An Eritrean man was deported on a flight from Heathrow to Paris at 6.15am after losing a High Court bid to halt his removal, becoming the second migrant to leave the country under the scheme after an Indian national was sent back on Thursday.
Meanwhile, in northern France, hundreds of migrants embarked on the Channel crossing early on Friday morning.
Speaking to broadcasters, also on Friday morning, Mr Lammy said: “It has been very important to increase the numbers of people that we are returning to the countries from which they are from, and that’s gone up 14%… I played an important role in that as foreign secretary and that work must continue.
“This pilot with France is a milestone because it sends an immediate deterrent to people, many of them coming obviously across the water, that we will send them back, and it is our hope to see that grow over the coming months and years because we have to bear down on the gangs and we have to smash the model effectively and we have to ensure that those who do not have a right to be here are sent back to the countries from which they are from.”
Pressed on whether the Government would take the US president’s apparent advice to call the military in to deal with immigration, he said: “We’ve got amazing border guard.”
He said that the Ministry of Defence was already working closely with the Home Office on plans to potentially move migrants onto military sites as the Government seeks to wind down the use of hotels as accommodation.
His fellow Cabinet minister Peter Kyle suggested earlier that the armed forces should remain focused on defence, after the US president signalled during his state visit that military intervention could be used to deal with rising immigration levels.
Asked about Donald Trump’s claims, the Business Secretary told BBC Breakfast: “Well, what he suggested was the military are used, but we have the UK Border Force that is now established and has been reinforced and bolstered and have new powers under this Government.
“The Navy actually does have a working relationship with the UK Border Force, and the Navy can be called upon if needed.”
But he later added: “What we really need at the moment is our military focused on all of those really key issues around the world, directly relating to our national defence.”
Elsewhere, Mr Kyle told Times Radio the Government was willing to change the law where needed to tackle the migration crisis.
“We are challenging the law where it needs to be done, and we are willing to change the law where it is appropriate,” he said.
Ministers have faced calls from the Tories and Reform to leave the European Convention on Human Rights in a bid to deal with illegal migration.
Senior Labour figures, including former foreign secretary Jack Straw, are also among those who have suggested that loosening the international agreement’s influence on UK law could help to remove more unauthorised migrants.
Speaking alongside Sir Keir Starmer on Thursday, Mr Trump suggested illegal migration “destroys countries from within”.
He also said: “You have people coming in, and I told the Prime Minister I would stop it, and it doesn’t matter if you call out the military, it doesn’t matter what means you use.”
At least one inflatable dinghy full of young men made its way out to sea from Gravelines beach, north-east Calais, at daybreak on Friday, with a small child wearing armbands and a flotation device seen among those embarking on the Channel.
As the boat came close to shore, people waded through waist-high water towards it and a child was passed aboard before it went out to sea.
In the town itself, at about 5.30am, a group of 40 young men suddenly appeared from a quiet side street carrying an inflatable boat over their heads before launching it into a canal.
Police officers watched on from the bank as the driver of the boat struggled to keep it in a straight line.
Earlier in the night, a group of men formed a human chain to help haul people out of the mud after a failed attempt to launch a boat in the canal.
Shadow home secretary Chris Philp said the Government’s removal of two migrants under the returns deal was “pathetic” and that “boasting about it is absurd”.
The Tory frontbencher said: “Hundreds of illegal immigrants crossed the Channel today alone and Labour want applause for removing just two – both of whom will be replaced… Removing only two is pathetic and boasting about it is absurd.”
He said the scheme would have “no deterrent effect whatsoever”, adding: “The Government should urgently adopt our Deportation Bill to disapply the Human Rights Act from immigration matters, deport all illegal arrivals immediately on arrival, close the loopholes exploited by activist lawyers and put in place a real deterrent.”
