Labour unveils how it will secure UK borders
Labour leader Keir Starmer has vowed to crack down on the “vile trade” of criminal gangs behind Britain’s small boats crisis if his party wins the next general election.
Migration is a contentious issue, acting as a dividing line between Labour and the Conservatives, and it will continue to be a focal point as they vie for voters’ support in the runup to the election.
Mr Starmer announced at a press conference on Friday that he plans to scrap the Conservative government’s Rwanda deportation scheme and allocate some of the saved funds to establish a new “elite Border Security Command” to be led by a former police, military or intelligence chief.
“Tackling organised crime is always hard, especially across borders,” he said in Dover, Kent.
“This is a criminal enterprise that we are dealing with – a business that pits nation against nation, that thrives in the grey areas of our rules, the cracks between our institutions, where they believe they can exploit some of the most vulnerable people in the world with impunity.”
Mr Starmer said Labour would set up “a new command with new powers, new resources and a new way of doing things”.
The Border Security Command will bring together hundreds of specialist investigators from the National Crime Agency, Border Force, immigration enforcement, the Crown Prosecution Service and MI5, “all working to a single mission, all freed from the bureaucracy that so often prevents collaboration between different institutions”, he said.
Mr Starmer added that a Labour government would provide the security command, which he said would be an “elite force, not a Cinderella service”, with £75 million ($86.7 million) of funding in the first year.
The Labour leader said turning a blind eye to people smuggling was “not a progressive or compassionate position”.
He said “our asylum system must be rebuilt and our borders must be secured”, accusing the Tories of being driven from a serious party of government “on to the rocks of their own delusion” in their pursuit of “gesture politics” over immigration.
He does not doubt the government will manage to initiate flights to Rwanda, but the deportation policy will not work, he added.
“We will restore serious government to our borders, tackle this problem at source and replace the Rwanda policy permanently,” he said.
Mr Starmer said he would also seek a new partnership with Europe to access real-time intelligence and that he has been to The Hague to push for a new security pact.
Stronger powers are needed to bring smuggling gangs to justice, including the ability to shut off internet access, close their bank accounts and trace their movements using intelligence agency information, he added.
“These shores will become hostile territory for you – we will find you. We will stop you. We will protect your victims with the Border Security Command. We will secure Britain’s borders,” he said, speaking directly to smuggling gangs.