Britain says it will start returning migrants who arrive in the country by boat across the English Channel to France in the coming days, part of a plan to crack down on illegal immigration, Reuters reports.
France and Britain are set to ratify a deal on the 5th of August that will see France take back migrants who arrive in Britain illegally. Britain has pledged to take in a certain number of asylum seekers from France who have relatives in the UK. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron announced in July they would launch a pilot project based on the “one out, one in” principle. By early August 2025, more than 25,000 people had entered Britain by crossing the English Channel, and Starmer has vowed to crack down on people-smuggling gangs and reduce the number of arrivals.
Starmer’s popularity has plummeted since his landslide election victory last year, and Nigel Farage’s populist Reform Party is now putting increasing pressure on the prime minister to halt migration. In recent weeks, the country has seen several waves of protests outside hotels housing asylum seekers, with both anti-migration and pro-immigration groups staging protests.
French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said
the deal between France and Britain was made with the clear aim of disrupting people-smuggling networks.
Meanwhile, British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper could not say how many migrants would be returned, saying the process would start gradually and then the numbers would increase. She also said that people caught on arrival would be returned to France rather than those already in Britain. The government has previously said it could be as many as 50 people returned a week, a small fraction of the total number of migrants.
Critics of the plan have said it will not be enough to deter people from crossing the Channel, but Cooper said the deal with France was only part of the government’s overall plan. The government is also punishing people smugglers, has started to monitor social media advertising, and is working with delivery companies to crack down on illegal employment often offered to migrants.
Britain has said the European Union and the European Commission have given their approval to the plan to combat migration.
Read also: Albania plans to become the first cashless country