This extraordinary reality lays naked how damaged UK immigration system is | UK | News | EUROtoday

So there’s the reality of it: French authorities are waving off migrants floating within the English Channel and telling them: “The UK will see you in an hour.” In a unprecedented case, French officers reportedly stopped a rubber boat filled with some 100 folks and, after eradicating simply 24 of them to assist hold it “afloat”, informed the remaining to attend for the British coastguard and Border Force to escort them onwards to assert asylum.

You can simply think about the glee of the 76 occupants given free passage to our shores. Not to say the smug smiles of these sending them on their manner – au revoir and bonne likelihood, since you’re off our palms now. The incident occurred at Gravelines close to Calais earlier this 12 months and, frankly, exhibits precisely why greater than 4,000 small boat migrants have arrived in Britain because the begin of March alone (seven folks died whereas crossing).

Despite Labour’s much-vaunted promise to “smash the gangs”, the system is damaged. How do we all know this? Certainly not due to UK officers, who I’d hoped could be protesting loudly to the French (as if!), however due to a newspaper investigation.

Meanwhile, official figures reveal 6,406 folks have efficiently made it to Britain on board 115 boats this 12 months, up virtually 40% on earlier arrivals. Last Wednesday alone, some 357 folks in six inflatable dinghies had been picked up.

This can’t go on. It’s all very properly for ministers to clutch their pearls and promise laws however, till the French begin taking this significantly and stopping boats, nothing will change. Ever. The quantity of people that wish to come right here illegally, and are ready to pay the folks smugglers, is infinite.

We should discover different options, urgently. Mass migration of all kinds is damaging neighborhood cohesion and making us poorer. We can’t afford to maintain bankrolling tens of 1000’s of unlawful migrants. And it’s not remotely racist to state that as reality.