Extra patrol boats needed to halt migrants and smugglers

BRITAIN should buy more offshore patrol boats and station them at ports up and down the country to protect the coastline from illegal immigration and smuggling after Brexit.

Policy Exchange, a centre-right think tank, is calling for more boats and even aircraft in addition to extending the range of radar beyond Dover.

At present the UK Border Protection Squadron, based in Portsmouth, has five patrol boats with a sixth on the way as well as cash for six smaller ones.

David Goodhart, Policy Exchange’s head of demography, immigration and integration, said: “If people believe that their national borders are well managed they are likely to worry less about the numbers crossing them.”

The report also called for a single unified authority to take charge of monitoring the nation’s coastal waters, stating that in 2016 smugglers were targeting small beaches in Kent and Sussex but with little extra cost, it added, “there are small ways in which the coastline could be made more secure”.

The report also recommended that harbour masters should be forced to collect passenger information from arriving boats, to be passed on to the authorities much as airlines have to do.

The report into border security also suggested that the Government should persuade more failed asylum seekers to leave the UK voluntarily by offering a “bigger carrot” than the £2,000 payment currently given.

This money could be taken from the UK’S foreign aid budget while countries that do not cooperate in taking back immigration offenders could see aid withheld.