Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announces new plans to 'boost border security' in bid to tackle small boat smuggling gangs

21 August 2024, 00:01 | Updated: 21 August 2024, 07:07

The Home Secretary has today announced plans to boost Britain’s border security in a bid to tackle gangs smuggling people across the Channel in small boats.

The Home Office confirmed Labour’s new Border Security Command "is gearing up" after the number of migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats topped 19,000 this year so far.

Yvette Cooper will today reveal plans to recruit 100 new specialist intelligence officers for the National Crime Agency and increase immigration detention spaces in a bid to enable more returns.

According to the Home Office, Labour believes it can achieve "the highest rate of removals of those with no right to be here, including failed asylum seekers" since 2018.

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They hope this will be achieved through new staff, the redeployment of current workers, sanctions on businesses employing illegal migrants and the addition of new 290 beds at immigration removal centres near Oxford and Portsmouth.

It comes as Conservative leadership contender Robert Jenrick, the MP for Newark, told LBC if he were Prime Minister, he would reintroduce a tougher Rwanda plan.

"Efforts to secure the border are now in limbo. That isn't right. Every passing day dozens, sometimes hundreds of people are entering the country, about whom we know next to nothing," he told Tom Swarbrick, criticised Ms Cooper's plans.

Rwanda scheme has already cost taxpayers £700 million, Cooper reveals

He added: "That to me is a national security emergency and I want to take an altogether different approach."

Proposed sanctions on businesses include financial penalty notices, business closure orders and potential prosecutions.

Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper said: “We are taking strong and clear steps to boost our border security and ensure the rules are respected and enforced.

“Our new Border Security Command is already gearing up, with new staff being urgently recruited and additional staff already stationed across Europe. They will work with European enforcement agencies to find every route in to smashing the criminal smuggling gangs organising dangerous boat crossings which undermine our border security and put lives at risk.

Ms Cooper added: “And by increasing enforcement capabilities and returns, we will establish a system that is better controlled and managed, in place of the chaos that has blighted the system for far too long.”

NCA Director General of Operations, Rob Jones, said: “Tackling organised immigration crime remains a key priority for the NCA and we are dedicating more effort and resource than ever before.

These extra officers will play a key role in that, with the NCA currently leading around 70 investigations into the highest harm people smuggling and trafficking groups.

“Taking on these dangerous and exploitative gangs requires international co-operation and we continue to further enhance our already strong relationship with Europol and other law enforcement partners. We are determined to do all we can to disrupt and dismantle these networks, whether they are operating in the UK or overseas.”

This comes after Conservative former Home Secretary James Cleverly called on Keir Starmer’s government to “get a grip” on the rising number of migrants crossing the channel on small boats.

"This new Government must urgently take action to get a grip on these ever rising crossing numbers," Mr Cleverly said on the weekend.

"When Labour ditched our deterrent (the Rwanda plan) they sent a dangerous signal to the people smugglers that they were not willing to take the tough action necessary to control our borders, and the smugglers are reaping the benefits."

Nearly 500 migrants crossed the English Channel on Saturday, in a week where hundreds had already made the perilous trip.

Some 492 people arrived in the UK on small boats on August 17, following the 107 that came on Wednesday and 125 on Monday.

Last Sunday saw 703 people arrive on British shores via the English Channel, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes.

Both of the busiest days for migrant crossings this year came under the previous Conservative government - 882 on June 18 and 711 on May 1.

Calmer weather is better for the crossings, which the migrants make in flimsy rubber dinghies, so people are more likely to risk the trip in those conditions.

Like the Tories before them, the Labour government has pledged to crack down on small boat crossings by "smashing the gangs" of people smugglers who organise the trips from the European continent.

But unlike the Conservatives, Labour has got rid of the scheme to move illegal immigrants to Rwanda.

The International Organisation for Migration, which records Channel crossing deaths as part of its Missing Migrant Project, estimates 226 people including 35 children are missing or have died after attempting the crossing as of January this year.

According to the French coastguard, there have been at least 19 deaths in 2024, including nine since the start of July. Last year, 12 migrants are thought to have died or were recorded as missing.