People smugglers bragging to migrants it’s safe to cross Channel now that UK has Labour govt
PEOPLE smugglers in France are bragging to migrants that it is safe to cross the Channel now that the UK has a new Prime Minister.
Gangs sending dangerously overcrowded small boats from Calais and Dunkirk are charging £1500-a-head for the dangerous journey as they take advantage of the good weather, The Sun can reveal.
The first small boats of Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership crossed yesterday as No10 braced for a “challenging” summer in the Channel.
New Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has vowed to “go after criminal smuggler gangs” by launching an elite Border Security Command taskforce.
The Sun has seen messages between a gang member offering spots on a dinghy and a would-be passenger.
The man, going by the name Sura, boasts on his TikTok page that he can get people across the country and even offered to drop the price to £1000-a-head if two people joined.
Asked if people could get sent to Rwanda, he said: “No. Never, That’s it the British prime minister has changed.”
He claimed to be in Dunkirk in northern France and ready to launch a boat in the morning.
In one message he bragged: “I am in the Dunkirk jungle myself now. If you like, I will charge you 2,000 (for 2 people).” Yesterday’s crossing takes the total number of arrivals this year to 13,600 – a record figure compared to this time last year.
Labour has axed the Conservatives’ Rwanda plan and will instead let migrants go through asylum processing to get the right to stay.
Under existing laws anyone who has arrived illegally since July last year is ineligible to claim asylum – instead going into taxpayer-funded accommodation at enormous cost.
With a current grant rate of 65 per cent, letting small boat migrants claim asylum could see tens of thousands given leave to remain in the UK.
Sir Keir’s spokesman said today: “We need to ensure that people who arrive here are processed so that people are not sitting in the system, housed in expensive taxpayer-funded hotels as they have been under previous administrations.”
It is unclear if this will apply only to the backlog of 50,000+ migrants already here, or whether future small boat arrivals will also be eligible.
Ms Cooper said she would be auditing the entire Rwanda scheme which has so far seen £290million sent to Kigali.
Asked if she was pushing for a refund, she told LBC: “We are looking now, we are auditing the whole of the Rwandan scheme the Conservatives have set up.
“It’s clearly been a complete con, we will see our next steps in due course. The most important thing right now is to get the Border Security Command in place.” Tory predecessor Suella Braverman said Ms Cooper’s promise to smash the gangs amounted to “more blah, blah, blah”.
She said: “I warned, but prepare to see the UK become an even bigger magnet for illegal arrivals and numbers soar as our borders disintegrate.”