More children cross Channel as Patel launches social media plea
Charities claim emphasis on males in Rwanda policy is encouraging increase in perilous migrant boat trips
RECORD numbers of children are making the perilous Channel crossing in small boats, figures show, as Priti Patel today launches an advertising blitz to deter the migrants.
Charities believe more children and women may have been encouraged to make the 21-mile journey in the belief that they will not be deported to Rwanda, a policy that has been primarily targeted at young male migrants.
They include around 1,000 unaccompanied children who have crossed the Channel in the first five months of this year. There have been 115 unaccompanied children already in June.
It comes as the Home Secretary launches a social media campaign to warn migrants in northern France and Belgium that even if they survive the dangerous crossing and reach the UK, they “could be leaving for Rwanda”.
Officials have said only unaccompanied children will be exempt.
Pierre Roques, from the charity l’auberge des Migrants said the warm sunny weather and calm seas were also behind the surge in the numbers of women and children crossing.
At least 900 migrants have crossed the Channel this week, taking the total this year to 11,000, double last year’s at the same point.
“Given the period of the year we’re entering with the nicer weather, there are a lot more people arriving in the camps [in Calais].
“We’re of course going to be expecting more families to cross during this time,” he said.
He said the migrants had been “following the Rwanda situation closely” and said it was “possible” the increase in women and children had “to do with the fact they feel like they won’t get sent to Rwanda”.
At midnight on Wednesday 43 migrants including at least a dozen children aged under 10 and a baby arrived on Dungeness beach after being rescued by an RNLI lifeboat.
A witness said they were “well dressed”, suggesting the route is becoming normalised with wealthier migrants. One woman refused to leave the boat which had to be dragged up the beach to the boathouse for her to do so. She said she did not want to be photographed as a potential deportee.
The Home Office campaign aims to counter claims by people-trafficking gangs that the arrangement with Rwanda is nothing but a “scare tactic”.
It follows Tuesday’s intervention by the European Court of Human Rights which grounded the first flight to
‘We have a duty to warn people of the risks of these journeys, and expose the lies of inhumane smugglers’
Rwanda after it backed a legal challenge by a 54-year-old Iraqi asylum seeker who came to Britain by small boat less than a month ago.
The adverts on Facebook and Instagram will target migrants in their native languages of Arabic, Kurdish, Pashto, Vietnamese and Farsi.
A Home Office spokesman said: “We have a duty to warn people of the risks of these journeys, and expose the lies sold to vulnerable people by inhumane smugglers.”
Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: “It is extremely worrying to hear that so many of those crossing the channel are women and children.
“It’s time for our Government to start having a grown-up conversation with France and the EU about sharing responsibility.”