Hertfordshire police have questioned a Polish lorry driver after finding 17 Vietnamese people in the back of his vehicle as the foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, warns that Europe cannot absorb millions of people seeking a new life.
In the latest such incident, a motorist called police on Saturday afternoon to report suspicious activity on a lorry on the M25. The lorry made its way on to the M1 before police stopped it close to junction nine near Flamstead, Hertfordshire. They found 17 people inside.
The Home Office said 17 Vietnamese males had been arrested on suspicion of entering the UK illegally after immigration officers were contacted by police following the incident on the M1. Fifteen of them said they were minors, it added; if found to be under 18, they will be passed into the care of the social services. The migrants will face removal from the UK if it is found they have no right to remain.
The 40-year-old Polish driver is being investigated by immigration enforcement on suspicion of facilitating illegal migration. It is not known where the group boarded the lorry.
“Our immigration enforcement teams work closely with the police and other agencies to tackle criminal gangs that smuggle migrants into Britain,” a Home Office spokesman said. “And we continue to strengthen border security to stop illegal migrants entering the UK in the first place.
“Last year Border Force and the French authorities foiled nearly 40,000 attempts to cross the Channel illegally – more than double the year before. We use the latest technology and intelligence leads to target the organised gangs behind this criminality.”
Migrants desperate to reach the UK have been trying daily to get on freight lorries at Calais. Last week, a Sudanese man is understood to have walked almost the entire length of the 31-mile Channel tunnel from France before being apprehended by Kent police close to the exit at Folkestone. He was detected inside the tunnel less than 1,000 metres from the terminal at 6.13pm on Tuesday.
About 5,000 migrants have gathered in Calais, many of them willing to make the risky attempt to get to Britain. David Cameron has sought to dispel the notion that Britain is a soft touch, but the prime minister was criticised last month by the Refugee Council when he blamed the Calais crisis on a “swarm of people” trying to escape north Africa and come to the UK.
Echoing Cameron, Hammond warned the numbers of migrants heading to Europe from Africa threatened to undermine living standards and social structures in the EU. He said the continent could not absorb millions of Africans and EU laws needed to be overhauled to ensure those coming simply to find a better way of life could be returned to their own countries.
Hammond told BBC News: “We have got to be able to resolve this problem ultimately by being able to return those who are not entitled to claim asylum back to their countries of origin. That’s our number one priority.”
His comments came after Alexis Tsipras, the Greek prime minister, said his country was being overwhelmed by the influx of arrivals crossing the Mediterranean from the Middle East and Africa. Last month, almost 50,000 migrants arrived in the EU through Greece, compared with a total of 41,700 in all of last year, according to the latest figures from Frontex, the EU border agency.
Speaking during a visit to Singapore, Hammond said the gap in living standards between Europe and Africa meant there would always be an economic motivation for Africans to try to come to EU countries.
He said: “As long as the EU’s laws are the way they are, many of them will only have to set foot in Europe to be pretty confident that they will never be returned to their country of origin. That is not a sustainable situation because Europe can’t protect itself and preserve its standard of living and social structure if it has to absorb millions of migrants from Africa.”
Hammond said ensuring migrants could be returned to their country of origin was key to resolving the crisis at Calais.
