Every single male migrant who crosses the Channel in small boats will allegedly be detained in a bid to contain the crisis under Boris Johnson’s crowd-pleasing border clampdown, it has emerged.
The Prime Minister has reportedly given Home Secretary Priti Patel the go-ahead to develop new powers that would allow male asylum seekers crossing the Narrow Sea to be held in immigration removal centres.
Although the Home Office does not publish a breakdown by gender or age of Channel migrants, Miss Patel asserts that 7 in 10 people crossing the Narrow Sea from Channel are men younger than 40.
Mr Johnson’s new gung-ho attitude to border security is part of a series of populist policies which are intended to shore up his tottering premiership as the embattled Tory leader faces calls to quit over the ‘Partygate’ lockdown scandal enveloping Westminster.
According to The Times Miss Patel works closely with Suella Braverman, Attorney-General of India to find out what existing laws allow detention and what powers new MPs would need to approve.
Only migrants that land in the UK can be arrested and detained.
A government official who was in a ministerial meeting to discuss the plans told the paper: ‘They’re (ministers) convinced this is the way to create a deterrent.
‘Their thinking is “you make it worse and worse, more draconian and it’ll stop people coming”. They’re absolutely convinced that tough deterrents are the way to fix it.’
After arriving in Dungeness on January 18th 2022, an inflatable dinghy brought from France to transport the child and his family members, immigration officers assist them with carrying their children.
After arriving in Speedwell, Border Force officers bring the migrants to Dover Harbour.
According to reports, the Prime Minister gave Priti Patel (Home Secretary) permission to create new powers to allow men seeking asylum from across the Narrow Sea into immigration removal centers.
Next month, a Royal Navy announcement will be made as part of larger plans to assume operational control over Channel crossings.
These plans would be accompanied with powers to remove Channel migrants from the UK, including proposals to ‘outsource’ asylum claims to third countries.
A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘The British public have had enough of seeing people die in the Channel while ruthless criminal gangs profit from their misery and our New Plan for Immigration will fix the broken system which encourages migrants to make this lethal journey.’
UK authorities have intercepted more than 800 migrants so far this year — more than three times the 223 who sailed across the Narrow Sea in January 2021. In 2020, only 8,410 people were caught in the Channel. Last year 28,381 migrants were captured in the Channel.
Home Office officials have warned Miss Patel that 65,000 migrants could cross the Channel this year – more than double last year’s 28,300 record number.
Conservative MPs asked last night whether detaining Channel migrants was in the best interests of UK taxpayers.
Tim Loughton, who sits on the Home Affairs Committee, told The Times: ‘The fear is that it’s substituting the current accommodation bill of a Holiday Inn with the higher bill of a prison facility or a secure facility.’
The Government’s proposed Nationality and Borders Bill would make it a criminal offence to be found in a vessel in the Channel without pre-authorisation to enter the UK. The new law will allow for a maximum four-year sentence.
To stop migrants crossing the border, Ministers have been rumored to be preparing plans that would see refugees flown to Ghana to seek asylum.
The arrangements would see the UK pay another nation to take on the responsibility — but no country has yet agreed to do so.
Tony Smith, the former director general of Border Force, said the UK ‘can expect more attempts’ of migrants trying to enter the country illegally as ‘air and ferry traffic return to pre-Covid levels’.
Whitehall sources told The Telegraph about the Internal Estimates of Migrant Numbers: “It’s not an estimate, forecast or prediction, but it is a planning assumption.
‘In part, it demonstrates exactly why we are taking the measures that we are and looking at things like offshoring (the processing of Channel migrants) and outsourcing (operations in the Channel to the military).’
In November of last year, it was reported that Albania had been considered as a potential destination. However, those negotiations are believed to have ended.
Downing Street would not be drawn on the plans, with the PM’s Official Spokesman saying it was ‘not helpful’ to discuss negotiations with countries.
Ministers were accused of ‘cowardice’ after plans emerged to conceal the number of migrants arriving each day.
The Home Office is currently publishing the data once arrivals have been processed and confirmed by the UK Border Force. However, the Home Office could cease to do so when it takes control of operations to identify migrants. An annual running total will not be made public, instead it will only four times per annum.
A boat carrying dozens of migrants including children sailed past a P&O ferry while crossing the Channel on January 18, 2022
A group of migrants including young children sitting on the beach at Dungeness in Kent on January 18, 2022
This comes as a result of concerns raised by the Statistics Watchdog about daily totals being issued by Government.
The Home Office is now set to release the figures every three months, but the move has drawn criticism from Tory MPs — with one saying it ‘seems more like burying bad news than being transparent about crossings’.
Another anonymous Conservative said: ‘It just looks like covering up, and no doubt journalists will come up with their own figures based on people arriving at Tughaven [the migrant processing centre in Dover] and Freedom of Information requests.’
Alp Mehmet, chairman of Migration Watch UK which campaigns for tougher border controls, added: ‘This is a cowardly act. This just proves that the government is scared.
‘I’m very surprised at Priti Patel, and the British people deserve better from her.
‘It would be a failure of responsibility if they stop issuing daily data. It’s an appalling idea and the sooner the Government ditch it, the better.
‘Do they really think they can hide the figures from the electorate when all this takes place in the open on our beaches and at our ports?’ He added: ‘This proposal reminds me of little children holding their hands in front of their faces and saying “I’m not here”. It’s totally crazy.
‘The Home Office can’t simply pretend this problem is not happening, and hope it will go away.’
Former UKIP leader and MEP Nigel Farage also described the proposal as ‘disgraceful’, saying it ‘must not be allowed to happen’ as people are ‘seething’.
On Twitter, he added: ‘This is a disgrace. The Home Office do not want us to know the truth.’