The Home Secretary, Priti Patel, has repeatedly promised to limit the number of people reaching UK shores in small boats by making this route “unviable”, but more than 27,000 refugees have crossed the canal in this way, up from 8,500 in 2020.
The Home Office is now planning to introduce a labeling scheme for asylum seekers after an “angry” Boris Johnson reportedly ordered a review. This is the latest proposal in a series of ideas aimed at clamping down on the arrival of small boats, none of which have succeeded in curbing numbers so far.
The ‘turn around’ tactic
In the fall, it emerged that Patel was preparing to push small boats carrying migrants into France, despite warnings from government lawyers that such maneuvers might be illegal. The Interior Ministry confirmed that Border Force personnel have been trained to use “rotate” tactics at sea under plans developed over two years.
Patel was also seeking legal protection for Border Force personnel who would send out boats should the refugee drown as a result. The French government rejected the transformation plan on the grounds that it might put lives at risk.
Asylum processing abroad
Another idea that has been brought up often is to send asylum seekers to another country, such as Gibraltar or islands in the South Atlantic Ocean, while their applications are being processed. This sparked anger among the parties. Plans for a “potential relocation of asylum processing centers abroad for those using secret entry routes into the UK” were quickly likened to the transfer of asylum seekers from Australia abroad to places such as Manus Island in Papua New Guinea.
Criminalization of driving small boats
Since the start of 2020, the UK government has been seeking to crack down on canal crossings by prosecuting people driving small boats carrying asylum seekers.
But the policy, under which the government has successfully brought 67 lawsuits related to trialing small boats under smuggling laws, was challenged last week, defeating the government.
The appeals court ruled that the conviction of four asylum seekers for driving small boats across the canal “must be overturned in time,” citing systemic deficiencies. The judges said convictions of this nature were subject to the prosecution’s ability to prove that the person accused of steering the boat “knew or had reasonable cause to believe that his act was aiding entry or attempting to enter the United Kingdom without permission”.
Putting signs
Under the Home Office’s “New Immigration Plan”, Patel is expected to announce early in the new year that arrivals by small boats will be electronically tagged.
Ministers hope that tagging people of working age will make it more difficult for them to work illegally while their asylum claims are being processed, and make it easier to remove those whose asylum application has failed. The CEO of the Joint Immigrant Welfare Council described the plan as “desperate and cruel”.
Cooperation deals with France
Patel has also tried to solve the problem financially: So far, it has agreed to two multi-million pound deals with French authorities – one for more than £28m in November 2020 and one for at least £54m in July – to increase surveillance over the 93 miles of the French coast which Attempts to reach the United Kingdom were launched from him.
France refused repeated requests from the UK government to jointly patrol the Channel with the help of French border forces and the navy.
Activists for refugees have claimed that opening safe and legal application routes for asylum seekers hoping to come to the UK – an option almost non-existent for all people seeking asylum in Britain – would deter many from attempting the dangerous crossing in small boats. .
The Home Office still requires people to physically arrive in the UK before they can apply for asylum.