The Labour Government is reportedly attempting to strike “one in, one out” migrant deals with Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands after a man returned by the French scheme re-entered the UK. Ministers reportedly want to “scale up” the immigration deal, through which people arriving in the UK can be detained and returned to France in exchange for those who applied through a legal route, by expanding it to other countries. Plans to enact the scheme on a larger scale were spearheaded by now-Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper when she was in the Home Office, sources said, but she ultimately decided to establish a bilateral deal with France first to show “proof of concept”.
42 migrants have been returned to France under the agreement, while 23 have been sent to Britain. The new measures attracted criticism when an Iranian national who had been deported under the deal returned to the UK this week, however, crossing the Channel a second time. Children’s minister Josh MacAlister told Times Radio that the man would be sent back to France and pledged to return others like him “again and again” until they collectively realise that making the journey is a “waste” of time and money.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has taken up the mantle in pushing for the UK-France agreement to be matched by others in the Calais Group, The Times reports, but “nothing is imminent”.
Another driving force behind the plans to enact the immigration deals on a larger scale may be the unstable political landscape in France, with a government source suggesting the replacement of Bruno Retailleau as interior minister had been a “huge blow” to hopes that French police would start intercepting asylum seeker boats in shallow waters.
Pressure is also continuing to grow on Labour to fulfil its promise of “smashing the gangs” and reduce migration numbers after the number of small boat arrivals in the UK this year exceeded the total of 36,816 recorded for the whole of 2024.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The Home Secretary has said she will do whatever it takes to restore order to our border. We continue to work closely with European partners on innovative solutions to tackle illegal immigration.”
Sir Keir Starmer defended the UK-France deal on the BBC this week, insisting that it had done more to deter small boat migrants than any other scheme since the crisis took shape in 2018.
“Showing that we can and will return people who come by small boats back to France is really important,” he said. “Many governments try to get an agreement like this. We’ve got one, and we are sending people back every week now, so that we’ve shown it’s working. We do need to ramp it up.”
Responding to questions about the Iranian who re-entered the UK after being deported, the Prime Minister said: “He’s already been detained, and he will now be fast-tracked back to France. So trying to get back here [has] been completely pointless, because he’s already in the system. We know who he is. We’ve got him, and we’re going to get him back out of the country very, very quickly.”