More than 100 Home Office staff redeployed from axed Rwanda scheme to new ‘rapid deportation unit’
MORE than 100 Home Office staff from the axed Rwanda plan are being redeployed to a rapid returns unit to deport illegal migrants.
Sir Keir Starmer has already scrambled more National Crime Agency operatives to the Netherlands to help Europol fight small boat smugglers.
He will channel Winston Churchill’s “action this day” mantra at the wartime leader’s birthplace — Blenheim Palace — as he meets allies today.
The PM will tell European counterparts to cooperate targeting trafficking gangs.
Writing below, Sir Keir says 2024 is “on course to be a new record for small boat crossings”.
More than 1,000 have arrived since Labour took office.
It came as the head of Illegal Migration Operations Command Stuart Skeates quit yesterday.
Sir Keir will attend the international migration working group session.
But France, which he believes is not doing enough, will not be there.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper will soon outline plans for illegal migrants to claim asylum.
It means tens of thousands could end up staying.
Labour says it is better than them languishing in hotels at a cost of £8million a day.
But Shadow Home Secretary James Cleverly said: “The question for Labour is what to do with people who arrive here illegally but cannot be returned to their home?
“Labour scrapped our plan to send them to a safe third country. Without a deterrent the boats will keep coming.”
Starmer's smuggling gang pledge
TODAY, I will sit down with leaders from across Europe.
I will make it clear that secure borders are a priority for my government.
And I will urge them to work with Britain to smash the vile criminal gangs that profit from illegal migration.
Every week vulnerable people are overloaded onto boats on the coast of France.
Infants, children, pregnant mothers – the smugglers do not care.
They’re making a fortune, breaching our borders.
Unbothered if people die in the English Channel.
And Sun readers are paying for it.
£8m of your money a day in hotel costs.
Many millions more thrown away on a failed Rwanda gimmick.
And what did all the rhetoric and grandstanding of the previous government amount to?
A legacy of failure.
This year is on course to be a new record for small boat crossings.
That has to change.
So, when I say we must smash the gangs, I mean it.
I meant it in the campaign. Now I’m taking action.
We will patrol our waters.
We will strengthen our borders.
We will work through the backlog in the Home Office to speed up decision-making.
This is crucial.
If the gangs know people can stay in hotels here, without a decision ever being made, then they will keep on recruiting people for the journey.
But with our new Border Security Command – launched last week – we also offer a completely new approach.
And we need it.
I scrapped the failed Rwanda scheme for a simple reason – it was an expensive gimmick.
Even if it had succeeded, even if everything went right, it could only have removed 1% of those arriving by small boats.
Yet with no flights ever having left, it didn’t even achieve that.
All for £280m of your taxes.
A total waste of time and money that could have been spent smashing the gangs instead.
This Government is not interested in gestures or gimmicks.
We are here to return government to practical policies that serve our country.
That’s what a Border Security Command will do.
It will bring together the best of the best from our intelligence agencies, police and immigration enforcement.
It will shut down the gangs’ smuggling routes.
Dismantle their networks.
And put their vile trade out of business for good.
I know this can be done.
As leader of the Crown Prosecution Service, I worked on operations that took down terrorist networks across Europe.
I will never accept the same approach cannot be applied to the people smugglers.
But to tackle this at source, we do need to work across borders.
And that means reaching out to other countries in Europe who face the same crisis as us.
We must work together.
Share intelligence and tactics.
Combine resources.
And make sure, wherever on our continent they pop up, we stand ready to take the gangs down.
No more gimmicks.
No more politics of performance.
My government is rolling up its sleeves and getting the job done.
That’s what Sun readers rightly expect and that’s what we’re delivering.
Grown-up politics, back in the service of working people.
That is what I will say in the home of Winston Churchill today.
It is time for action.