Tag: small boats

Starmer unveils ‘game changing’ investment to tackle national security threat from people smuggling gangs

Prime Minister set to announce an additional £75 million to boost border security, bringing the investment in the Border Security Command over the next two years to £150 million

  • PM to outline major investments to smash criminal smuggling gangs at INTERPOL General Assembly in Glasgow
  • New capabilities for Border Security Command from £150 million funding pot to drive down Organised Immigration Crime both at home and overseas 
  • New additional funding will cover state-of-the-art tech and information centres, boosts to enforcement and intelligence resourcing and expanding CPS capacity

The Prime Minister is set to announce an additional £75 million to boost border security, bringing the investment in the Border Security Command over the next two years to £150 million. 

Marking the first time the INTERPOL General Assembly has been hosted in the UK in over 50 years, Keir Starmer will today (4 November) open the Assembly in Glasgow by setting out his personal mission to smash the people smuggling gangs by resetting the UK’s whole approach to this challenge and intensifying international collaboration to meet the global scale of the threat.

The General Assembly is INTERPOL’s supreme governing body and comprises senior ministerial and policing leads from the organisation’s 196 member states. 

In his speech, the Prime Minister will set out his plans to draw on his experience of bringing together agencies to tackle international terrorist and drug smuggling gangs during his time as Director of Public Prosecutions to dismantle the people smuggling gangs who drive illegal migration, profit from human misery and represent a serious threat to global security. 

He will also set out how the £150 million will provide additional specialist investigators and state of the art surveillance equipment to ensure those behind this criminal activity are stopped and brought to justice. 

This major funding boost for the government’s new Border Security Command will initially be directed towards a range of enforcement and intelligence activity, including:

  • Investing heavily in NCA technology and capabilities, delivering advanced data exploitation and improvements to technologies to boost collaboration with European partners to investigate and break people smuggling networks.
  • 300 staff for the new Border Security Command, who will strengthen global partnerships, deliver new legislation and lead the system through investment and strategy.
  • 100 specialist investigators and intelligence officers for the NCA, dedicated to tackling criminals who facilitate people smuggling. 
  • Creating a new specialist OIC Intelligence Source Unit which will cohere intelligence flows from key police forces. 
  • Boosting the Crown Prosecution Service’s ability to deliver charging decisions more quickly on international organised crime cases. 

The Border Security Command, led by Martin Hewitt CBE QPM, will be provided with enhanced powers – through a new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill – to tackle organised immigration crime whilst providing for strong and effective border security. 

New measures will make it easier to detect, disrupt and deter those seeking to engage in and benefit from organised immigration crime. The Command will also coordinate the work of intelligence agencies and law enforcement, who lead joint investigations with European counterparts to ensure we can bring those responsible to justice.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer will say: “The world needs to wake up to the severity of this challenge.  I was elected to deliver security for the British people. And strong borders are a part of that. But security doesn’t stop at our borders.  

“There’s nothing progressive about turning a blind eye as men, women and children die in the Channel.

“This is a vile trade that must be stamped out – wherever it thrives. So we’re taking our approach to counter-terrorism – which we know works, and applying it to the gangs, with our new Border Security Command. 

“We’re ending the fragmentation between policing, Border Force and our intelligence agencies.”

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “Criminal smuggler gangs profit from undermining our border security and putting lives at risk and they have been getting away with it for far too long.

“Our new Border Security Command, with the investment set out today, will mean a huge step change in the way we target these criminal gangs.

“People smugglers and traffickers operate in networks across borders, that’s why we have launched a major boost to our cooperation with international partners including other European countries, the G7 and Europol, and why we are so pleased to be hosting the INTERPOL conference on tackling international crime in Glasgow today.”

The Prime Minister will also announce that the UK Government has increased its in-year support for INTERPOL’s global operations through a £6 million investment which harnesses the organisation’s unique capabilities to tackle serious organised crime affecting the UK. 

Addressing the General Assembly, the Prime Minister will say that closer cooperation with international partners is key as he details how the gangs’ operations span from the money markets in Kabul through to the Kurdish region of Iraq and right across Europe and into the UK. 

He will stress the government’s ongoing commitment to strengthening security agreements to facilitate greater sharing of intelligence and more joint operational work, in particular through Europol. 

The Home Office will also invest £24m in the new financial year to tackle international serious organised crime affecting the UK including drugs and firearms, fraud, trafficking and exploitation. Funds will in part be used to bolster work done by special prosecutors and operational partners in the Western Balkans.

There were more than 5,000 drug related deaths in 2023, with most of the illegal drugs causing these coming from overseas or facilitated by transnational gangs. ISOC funding will also be used to tackle drug smuggling upstream and at the UK border, building on recent successes, such as the effective collaboration with the US and Ecuador, which has resulted in the seizure of 19 tonnes of cocaine.

National Crime Agency Director General Graeme Biggar said: “Serious and organised crime causes more harm, to more people, more often than any other national security threat.

“And almost all of serious and organised crime now has an international nexus. Distance, borders and languages are meaningless to criminals. This is why collaborations with INTERPOL have never been as important as they are today.

“Tackling organised crime, and especially immigration crime, remains a top priority for the NCA. We are currently leading around 70 investigations into the gangs or individuals involved in the highest echelons of this type of criminality, and we are devoting more resources to it than ever before.

“We have built up our intelligence sharing effort with law enforcement partners across Europe and beyond, including having more NCA officers based overseas, sharing intelligence and working side by side on joint investigations.

“This approach is bringing operational results with arrests and prosecutions, but we are also we are seeking to disrupt the people smugglers’ business model, through targeting their social media offering, their supply routes for equipment, and their financial flows.

“We are determined to do all we can to disrupt and dismantle these networks, wherever they operate.”

The announcement comes a month after Britain joined up to a new G7 anti migrant smuggling action plan which included pledges to bolster border security, combat transnational organised crime, and protect vulnerable individuals from exploitation by smugglers. 

The plan includes new, intelligence-led joint investigative actions to target criminal smuggling routes, working with social media platforms and internet providers to remove harmful content promoting illegal migration services or advertising fake job opportunities, and strengthening capabilities to monitor and anticipate irregular migration flows at both global and regional levels.

G7 nations agree new plan to dismantle migrant smuggling gangs

The Home Secretary has agreed a major international plan to smash criminal gangs responsible for smuggling illegal migrants into G7 nations

The G7 Anti-Smuggling Action Plan will deliver a boost to UK law enforcement by fostering closer cooperation with G7 partners to bolster border security, combat transnational organised crime, and protect vulnerable individuals from exploitation by migrant smugglers.

New joint investigative actions will be carried out by law enforcement teams to target criminal smuggling routes, while intelligence sharing between G7 nations will ensure faster identification and disruption of these dangerous networks.

This approach will enhance the capabilities of the Border Security Command and its new Commander Martin Hewitt CBE QPM in coordinating investigations with international partners to reduce illegal migration to the UK.

Other measures announced in the plan include: 

  • sharing best practice, including disrupting supply chains that facilitate people-smuggling, such as small boat parts, seizing the illegal financial assets of criminals, and improving cooperation across global transport routes
  • working with social media platforms and internet providers to remove harmful content that promotes illegal migration services or advertises fake job opportunities
  • strengthening capabilities to monitor and anticipate irregular migration flows at both global and regional levels

The agreement comes after discussions by the Home Secretary at the G7 Interior and Security Ministers’ meeting in Avellino, Italy, this week. It marks another step in the UK’s reset of relations with key allies and affirms a shared commitment to working together to tackle complex cross-border issues. 

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “Criminal smuggling gangs who organise small boat crossings undermine our border security and put lives at risk. Our new government is rapidly accelerating cooperation with other countries to crack down on these dangerous gangs.

“Today’s newly agreed G7 action plan provides an important focus on international law enforcement and reflects our determination to work with global partners on these shared challenges. New international joint investigative teams will help coordinate cross-border action and supplement the measures we have already taken to set up the UK Border Security Command and back it with new funding.

“The plan will help to increase both voluntary and enforced returns of migrants to countries of origin. It aims to offer migrants more choices and improve the overall management of migration flows.”

Instrumental to delivery of this plan in the UK is the new Border Security Command, under the leadership of Martin Hewitt CBE QPM, which will be armed with enhanced powers and coordinate the work of law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

It will coordinate investigations with European counterparts and will benefit from a £75 million investment in cutting-edge technology, additional officers, and new covert capabilities.

In July, the government committed a further £84 million to addressing the root causes of irregular migration. This funding will go towards programmes aimed at tackling the drivers of migration at their source, reducing the need for dangerous and irregular journeys.

Since taking office, the Home Secretary has increased efforts to work with international partners to tackle the challenges posed by irregular migration.

This has included engagement with the United States Attorney General, Merrick Garland, European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, and Executive Director of Europol, Catherine De Bolle.

The UK will continue to drive focus on tackling migrant smuggling with the G7 under Canada’s presidency next year, and at next month’s INTERPOL General Assembly in Glasgow.

Asylum accommodation and Rwanda: Little to show for money spent so far, PAC report finds

Westminster’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has published its report scrutinising asylum accommodation and the UK-Rwanda Partnership.

The report finds that, despite the Home Office committing significant sums of money to the Rwanda partnership and its large accommodation sites, there is little to show for the money spent so far.

Questions also remain as to what will happen to the more than 50,000 people left in limbo by the system – people who are living in the UK, with no ability to claim asylum, who are officially “pending relocation”.

On asylum accommodation, the report welcomes Government’s progress in closing asylum hotels in communities.

However, the report finds the Home Office’s assessment of the requirements for setting up alternative accommodation in large sites fell woefully short of reality and risked wasting taxpayers’ money, while the new sites will not house anywhere near as many people as initially expected, exacerbating existing accommodation issues.

No case for routinely offering asylum to claimants from ‘safe’ Albania

A report published today by the Home Affairs Committee has found little evidence to indicate significant numbers of Albanian nationals are at risk in their own country and require asylum in the UK.  

However, some Albanian citizens making asylum claims will have been trafficked, and women are disproportionately at risk from this form of crime. The UK has an obligation to support trafficking victims and they should only be returned to Albania if appropriate safeguards are in place. 

In 2022, more than a quarter of the 45,755 people who crossed the Channel in small boats came from Albania and most claimed asylum. In one year the number of Albanians arriving in the UK by this route had gone from 800 to 12,301, a rise that was both unexpected and unexplained. 

Albania is a safe country, it is not at war and is a candidate country to join the European Union. There is no clear basis for the UK to routinely accept thousands of asylum applications from Albanian citizens, the Committee finds. 

However up to June 2022, 51% of asylum claims from Albania were initially accepted, a rate far higher than many comparable European nations. Nine countries, including Germany, accepted no asylum claims from Albania. The Home Office must explain why the UK’s acceptance rate was so high, particularly compared to other countries. It must also explain why the acceptance rate is substantially higher for women (88%) than for men (13%). 

Maintaining positive relations with the Albanian Government should also be a key priority to ensure that the UK can return irregular migrants and offenders from UK prisons. Politicians, commentators and others should be careful to show restraint in their language and not single out Albania as the sole cause of the UK’s asylum pressures. 

The report focusses on Albania due to the unexpected spike in small boat crossings and asylum claims by Albanian nationals in 2022. However, the Committee finds that it should not be singled out and scapegoated in relation to the UK’s ongoing asylum backlog or overcrowding at immigration processing centres.

The Prime Minister has committed to clearing the backlog by the end of the year and the Home Office needs to set out how it plans to achieve this. The Government should also provide quarterly progress reports, including information on the number of pending claims in the backlog, staffing levels for asylum caseworkers numbers and the number of asylum decisions made per week. 

A key driver of migration from Albania to the UK is economic. People are prepared to make the journey, even in dangerous small boat crossings, for improved job prospects and higher incomes. The desire to come to the UK will continue until Albania become wealthier. 

Improved awareness of work visa programmes would support formalised migration to the economic benefit of the UK and Albania, providing an alternative to people smuggling gangs and reducing the burden on the asylum system. 

Only 325 work visas were granted to Albanian nationals in the first nine months of 2022, with evidence submitted to the inquiry arguing that a perceived difficulty in obtaining work in the UK through legal means could be driving people towards clandestine migration routes.

The Committee finds that more should be done to promote the availability of visas that would fill worker shortages in the UK economy and enable some transfer of wealth back to Albania. This would include short-term or seasonal work in sectors such as construction or agriculture. 

Home Affairs Committee Chair, Dame Diana Johnson MP, said: “Such a substantial sudden increase in asylum claims from a seemingly peaceful country understandably raised concerns.

“While it is important that questions are asked and lessons are learnt, it is clear that the immigration picture is not static and will continue to evolve. New challenges are likely to continue to emerge and it is important that the UK improves its overall approach to asylum, rather than focus on one country. 

“Changes in migration will inevitably place strain on any system, but the Government must do much more to ensure it can better handle these stresses. Most importantly it must improve the speed of decision making and clear the backlog as we set out in our Channel Crossings report in 2022. We expect the Home Office to set out how it plans to achieve this. 

“People will continue to be attracted to the UK from Albania while it continues to offer job opportunities and higher wages. The UK should look at how access to work visa schemes can be improved to fill our skills or staffing gaps, while offering Albanian nationals a route to higher income, benefiting both nations.” 

UK and Rwanda strengthen agreement to deal with global migration issues

The Home Secretary has hailed the strengthening of the partnership with Rwanda as both countries vow to step up efforts in dealing with global migration challenges.

Under the innovative Migration and Economic Development Partnership, people who make dangerous, unnecessary and illegal journeys to the UK, such as by small boat, will be relocated to Rwanda, where they will be supported to rebuild their lives.

Suella Braverman travelled to Kigali yesterday for official engagements with Rwandan President Paul Kagame and Rwandan Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Co-operation, Dr Vincent Biruta, this weekend (March 18 and 19).

The Home Secretary and Dr Biruta reiterated their desire to deliver the partnership, amid a global migration crisis that has seen 100 million people displaced and people smugglers cashing in on human misery.

They outlined the global leaders’ commitment to working on bold and innovative migration policies to redress the balance between legal and uncontrolled migration. The government of Rwanda reiterated the country’s readiness to receive thousands of individuals, process their claims and house them before they are moved to longer-term accommodation, with necessary support services including health and education provisions.

The Home Secretary and Dr Biruta also signed an update to the memorandum of understanding, expanding the partnership further to all categories of people who pass through safe countries and make illegal and dangerous journeys to the UK.

This will have the added benefit of preparing the UK to deliver on the measures proposed in the Illegal Migration Bill, as it will mean that anyone who comes to the UK illegally – who cannot be returned to their home country – will be in scope to be relocated to Rwanda.

The new bill, which was introduced to Parliament last week, will see people who come to the UK illegally face detention and be returned to their home country, or a safe third country such as Rwanda.

The scheme is uncapped and the government of Rwanda have confirmed they are able to take thousands of people eligible for relocation.

In December, the UK government secured an important victory in the High Court on the legality of the partnership and will continue to defend the policy against ongoing legal challenge, while working with Rwanda to ensure flights can operate as soon as there are no legal barriers.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman said: “We cannot continue to see people risking their lives crossing the Channel, which is why I am pleased to strengthen our agreement even further with the government of Rwanda so we can address the global migration crisis head on.

“The Migration and Economic Development Partnership is key to breaking the business model of people smugglers while ensuring those who genuinely need protection can be helped to rebuild their lives.

“Rwanda is a progressive, rapidly growing economy at the forefront of innovation – I have thoroughly enjoyed seeing first-hand the rich opportunities this country can provide to relocated people through our partnership.”

Rwanda’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Vincent Biruta said: “If we are to successfully tackle the global migration crisis, we need innovative, urgent action.

“This Partnership addresses the opportunity gap at the heart of the migration crisis, by investing in Rwanda’s capability to continue offering migrants the opportunity to build new lives in a safe, secure place, through accommodation, education, and vocational training.

“For these reasons, we are pleased to once again renew our commitment to our ground-breaking Partnership with the UK, which shares our determination to solve this crisis.”

On the visit, the Home Secretary will spend time meeting refugees, who have been supported by the government of Rwanda to rebuild their lives. She will also see new housing developments, which will be used to relocate people.

She also visited new modern, long-term accommodation that will support those who are relocated to settle in Rwanda.

The Home Secretary also met with investment start-ups and entrepreneurs to discuss the range of business and employment opportunities available to people in Rwanda.

The partnership with Rwanda is just one strand of the work the government is doing to tackle illegal migration. Last week the Prime Minister agreed a package with France which will see a new detention centre established in France as well as the deployment of more French personnel and enhanced technology to patrol beaches.

Prime Minister agrees unprecedented measures to tackle illegal migration alongside France

Package will see a new detention centre established in France as well as the deployment of more French personnel and enhanced technology to patrol beaches in a shared effort to drive down illegal migration

  • Package will see a new detention centre established in France as well as the deployment of more French personnel and enhanced technology to patrol beaches in a shared effort to drive down illegal migration.
  • The unparalleled multi-year agreement delivers on the PM’s priority to stop small boats and builds on joint measures taken with France in 2022 which increased patrols by 40%.
  • Enhanced cooperation aims to increase the interception rate for attempted crossings and drastically reduce the number of crossings each year.

Hundreds of extra French law enforcement officers will use enhanced technology and intelligence insight to prevent illegal Channel crossings under a new agreement struck by the Prime Minister and President Macron in Paris yesterday.

For the first time, the UK will help fund a detention centre in France to enhance the country’s ability to cope with the level of people being trafficked across the Channel. This new centre will support French efforts to increase detention capacity, allowing more migrants who might otherwise travel by dangerous and illegal routes to the UK to be removed from the French coast.

Building on our existing partnership, which saw twice as many illegal crossings stopped in 2022 than 2021, today’s agreement will also more than double the number of personnel deployed in northern France to tackle small boats, with over half of these in place by the end of the year. The UK will contribute funding towards this.

Efforts will be bolstered by a new, highly trained, permanent French mobile policing unit dedicated to tackling small boats. Additional drones, aircraft and other technologies like surveillance will also be deployed, as the UK and France step up intelligence sharing to clamp down on people trafficking routes.

These French efforts will be overseen by a new 24/7 zonal coordination centre, with permanent UK liaison officers. The coordination centre will bring all relevant French law enforcement partners together for the first time to coordinate the response to an alarming trend which has seen a 50% rise in illegal migration across Europe in the last year. The UK has our own Small Boats Operations Command which has ensured that 99% of those who enter British waters are intercepted.

This enhanced cooperation aims to increase the increase the interception rate for attempted crossings and drastically reduce the number of crossings each year, supporting our long-term, shared goal of completely stopping this illegal migration route.

The Prime Minister said: “I have made it one of my five priorities to stop the boats. We are delivering on that priority to stop people coming to the UK illegally.

“Last year I agreed the largest ever small boats deal with France to increase UK-funded patrols by 40 per cent. This week I announced measures to ensure nobody who enters the UK illegally can remain here.

“We don’t need to manage this problem, we need to break it. And today, we have gone further than ever before to put an end to this disgusting trade in human life. Working together, the UK and France will ensure that nobody can exploit our systems with impunity.”

In addition to the extra steps taken to patrol the beaches in the north of France, today’s agreement will also see further UK and French cooperation upstream to stop illegal migration at source. This includes further coordination between the National Crime Agency and its French counterpart via officers based in countries along the routes favoured by people traffickers.

Alongside last year’s deal with France, the Prime Minister has taken a number of steps to curb illegal migration since taking office. This includes re-establishing the Calais Group of Northern European nations to disrupt traffickers and setting a long-term ambition for a UK-EU wide agreement on returns – an ambition France has confirmed today that they share.

This week the UK Government has announced a Bill to end illegal entry as a route to asylum in the UK.

These measures will remove the incentive for people to risk their lives through dangerous and unnecessary journeys and pull the rug from under the criminal gangs profiting from this misery once and for all.

Illegal migrants will be detained and swiftly removed to their home country if safe, or another safe third country, such as Rwanda, where they will be supported to rebuild their lives.

Anyone illegally entering the UK will be prevented from accessing the UK’s world-leading modern slavery support or abusing these laws to block their removal.

The only challenges that will suspend removal will be where someone claims that their removal to a safe third country would lead to a real risk of serious and irreversible harm, or on the basis that they do not fall within the cohort of persons liable to removal under the Bill. Any other challenges or human rights claims can also only be heard after removal, remotely.

By ending illegal immigration as a route to asylum, stopping the boats and taking back control of our borders the Bill will ensure the UK can better support people coming through fair, safe and legal routes.