Rishi Sunak today hailed a 72m euro (£63m) deal with Paris which will see UK officials joining operations in France for the first time to halt unauthorised Channel crossings.
The prime minister said the agreement – finalised on Monday morning by home secretary Suella Braverman and her French counterpart Gerald Darmanin – would be “a foundation” for more co-operation in coming months.
Speaking to reporters travelling with him to the G20 summit in Indonesia, Mr Sunak said it was his “absolute priority” to get a grip on the small boats issue, which had occupied more of his time since becoming PM last month than anything apart from the economy.
He acknowledged there was no single solution to the problem, which would not be “fixed overnight”. But he said he was “confident” of bringing down numbers of migrants arriving on the Kent coast.
The one-year deal was announced a day after the tally of arrivals by dinghy in the UK from France topped a record 40,000 so far this year. It brings to 200m euros (£175m) the total paid by the UK to France to fund anti-migrant operations since 2018.
Immigration minister Robert Jenrick on Sunday announced plans to set up camps to house migrants in disused holiday camps or student accommodation while their asylum claims are processed, to bring a halt to the use of hotels at a cost of around £7m a day.
A 10-point plan to deal with the issue is also expected to include fast-track returns for Albanian migrants, who make up a growing proportion of those arriving by boat, and a review of the modern slavery laws under which many arrivals claim protection.
Under the new deal with Paris, France will commit to increase numbers of officers patrolling beaches on the Normandy coast by 40 per cent in the hope of detecting and disrupting embarkations.
And they will be equipped with drones and night vision equipment to improve their chances of spotting boats as they put to see.
France will invest in reception and removal centres for migrants whose journeys to the UK are prevented, in order to deter repeated attempts to make the perilous trip across the Channel.
For the first time, UK Border Force officials will be embedded in French control centres to observe operations and share intelligence.
Meanwhile, security around ports will be improved, with more CCTV, surveillance equipment and detection dog teams.
And a new taskforce will be set up to focus on reversing the recent rise in Albanian nationals using illegal migration routes into Western Europe and the UK.
“I do think that the absolute priority that the British people have right now – as do I – is to grip illegal migration,” said Mr Sunak.
“I made a commitment that I would grip it in the summer. And I can tell you all that I’ve spent more time working on that than anything else – other than obviously the Autumn Statement – over the past couple of weeks.”
Mr Sunak acknowledged that there was not a single answer to the small boats issue, and conceded that he cannot fix it “overnight”.
But he added: ”There’s a range of things I’m working on, including the French deal, where I’m confident we can bring the numbers down over time and that’s what I’m going to deliver.”
Mr Sunak said he had discussed migration with French president Emmanuel Macron when the pair met on the margins of the COP27 climate change summit in Egypt.
He said: “Only by working with other countries can you make progress on the things that impact people at home.
