Sir Keir Starmer has said 24,000 people who “have no right to be here” have been returned since Labour took power as he opened the government’s border security summit.
The prime minister said it was the “highest return rates for eight years”.
Politics latest: UK has been ‘soft touch on migration’, says Starmer
Since Labour took office last July, 29,884 people have been detected crossing the Channel on 542 small boats.
A total of 6,642 people crossed between 1 January to 30 March this year – a 43% increase on the same time last year, when the Conservatives were in power.
Crossings this year passed 5,000 on 21 March, a record compared with the previous seven years since the first crossings in 2018 – and 24% higher than 2024, and 36% higher than 2023.
Interior ministers and law enforcement from more than 40 countries, including the US, Iraq, Vietnam and France, are at the summit at Lancaster House in central London.
Meta, X and TikTok representatives are also there to discuss how to tackle the online promotion of illegal migration.
The PM said countries need to band together to tackle illegal migration. Pic: PA
Sir Keir told the gathering he was “angry” about the scale of illegal immigration around the world as he said it was a “massive driver of global insecurity”.
“The truth is, we can only smash these gangs once and for all if we work together,” he said.
“Because this evil trade, it exploits the cracks between our institutions. It pits nations against one another. It profits from our inability at the political level to come together.”
He said people smuggling should be treated as a global security threat similar to terrorism.
Combining resources and sharing intelligence and tactics is the only way to tackle organised immigration crime, he added.
“None of these strategies, as you know, are a silver bullet. I know that,” he told the summit.
“But each of them is another tool, an arsenal that we’re building up to smash the gangs once and for all. We must pull every lever available.”
Immigration policy: A political wasteland where prime ministers’ careers go to die
In a speech at the organised immigration crime summit, Sir Keir Starmer pointedly told global delegates there is nothing progressive or compassionate about turning a blind eye to people smuggling.
This is as much a direct challenge to other nations as it is to those in his party who may be uncomfortable with talk of cracking down on illegal migration and making it harder to claim asylum in the UK.
In an effort to front up to the problem, the PM and home secretary both outlined the deep complexities involved in stopping the boats; interrupting supply chains, financial sanctions on gangs and blocking social media content advertising routes to the UK.
Labour’s message? Bear with us, this is harder than it looks.
But, with public patience wearing dangerously thin on small boats crossings after endless promises from Labour and the Conservatives, and with record numbers crossing the Channel – a 43% rise on this time last year – the prime minister knows he has very little time to persuade the public he can deliver.
Senior government sources tell me they are far more worried about the Reform party denting their vote share than they are about the Conservatives – and the PM’s message today indicates just that.
In his speech, Sir Keir twice cited what he called the unfairness of illegal migration: driving down working people’s wages, terms and conditions, and putting valuable public services under strain.
This shift in tone, directly juxtaposing working people with migrants, feels like a subtle yet significant tilt to voters who may be tempted by Nigel Farage’s rhetoric on migration.
However, we may begin to see some Labour MPs fidgeting in their seats as it is sure to make some of them a little uncomfortable.
Sir Keir appears to be marching up the hill the Tories died on. So will this all too familiar hike prove fatal, or will he succeed where Rishi Sunak failed?
And if Sir Keir does succeed and manages to make a significant dent in the number of small boat crossings before the next general election, Reform may not prove to be as lethal an opponent as first thought.
UK has been a soft touch on migration
The prime minister criticised the previous Conservative government for allowing illegal migration to soar, saying: “For too long the UK has been a soft touch on migration.”
He said a lack of co-ordination between the police and intelligence agencies had been an “open invitation” for people smugglers to send migrants to the UK.
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Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper at the Organised Immigration Crime Summit.
Pic: PA
Cooper reveals small boats gang tactics
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper also spoke at the event, where she revealed some of the horrifying tactics used by gangs smuggling people over to the UK in small boats.
She said they place women and children in the middle of the flimsy rigid inflatable boats (RIBs) and when they collapse due to overcrowding, they fold in and crush them.
“All of your countries will have different stories of the way in which the gangs are exploiting people into sexual exploitation, into slave labour, into crime, the way in which the gangs are using new technology, not just the phones, the social media to organise, but even the drones to spot where the border patrols are,” she told the summit.
“But it is governments and not gangs who should be deciding who enters our country.
“And those gangs are operating and profiting across borders. So we and our law enforcement need to cooperate across borders now to take them down.”
Sir Keir also hosted a roundtable discussion joined by border security and asylum minister Dame Angela Eagle, Border Security Commander Martin Hewitt and Home Office, Border Force and National Crime Agency officials.
The PM led a roundtable discussion with UK law enforcement and ministers. Pic: Reuters
Ministers ‘disappointed’ in small boat numbers
Before the summit, Dame Angela told Wilfred Frost on Sky News Breakfast ministers were “disappointed” in the number of small boat crossings in recent months.
She said one reason was more people were being packed into each boat. She also said smuggler gangs have been allowed to grow “very sophisticated” global networks over many years.
Early on Monday morning, Ms Cooper announced £30m will go towards funding “high impact operations” by the Border Security Command (BSC) to tackle supply chains, illicit finances and trafficking routes across Europe, the Western Balkans, Asia and Africa.
An additional £3m will be provided to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to increase its capacity to prosecute organised international smugglers and to support the BSC to pursue and arrest those responsible for people smuggling operations.