Small boat crossings would be “thousands higher” under the Conservatives, the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, has said, though they remain 20% higher than this time last year.
But Cooper declined to say when people could expect to see the number reduce, saying only that the government was making progress on reducing the asylum backlog, accusing the previous government of having “crash[ed] the asylum system”.
In an interview with the BBC, Cooper hinted again that the UK was interested in examining third-country processing for migrants who had arrived in the UK illegally from safe countries.
She said the government was on track for its worst year for migrant crossings had the same approach continued, but said the number of crossings was lower than 2022. The number of people who have arrived in Britain on small boats so far this year stands at 34,880, up 20% on this time last year but down 22% on 2022.
On Sunday, Cooper announced the formation of a joint unit in the Foreign Office and Home Office to monitor migration and returns agreements. It is expected to put new a focus on UK embassies to prioritise bringing down small boat crossings and drive up returns, especially in source and transit countries.
Cooper told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme: “What we inherited from the first half of this year … record high levels of boat crossings – had that continued we were on track really for the worst year ever for small boat crossings.
“Had that continued we would have had many thousands more crossings over the course of the summer and through the autumn. As it is, we’re around a quarter lower than 2022 – that was the peak year. But that is no comfort when you still have these small boat crossings, where we’ve got lives being put at risk and huge numbers of lives being lost, and also these criminal gangs are profiting from undermining our border security.”
Cooper was speaking in Italy after a summit with her Italian counterpart, Matteo Piantedosi, where the two countries announced a cooperation agreement on illicit finance from smuggling gangs.
The home secretary said again the UK was committed to looking at the third-country processing agreement Italy had struck with Albania. “We will look at whatever works. Clearly everything has to meet proper international standards, clearly it has to be effective and has to deliver results,” she said.
“The interesting thing about the Italy/Albania arrangement, and you’re right that hasn’t fully started yet, is that at the heart of this is a plan to effectively fast-track cases from predominantly safe countries.
“We are interested in doing that in the UK, to fast-track decisions for people arriving from countries that are predominantly safe, where we should be able to take those decisions swiftly and be able to return people swiftly. That hasn’t happened in the past. So we are interested to develop that in the UK; we think that’s an important principle.”
Asked on Sky’s Trevor Phillips programme for a date by which the government would reduce small boat crossings, the minister for border security, Angela Eagle, said: “I’m not going to sit here and say that, when you’re presented with something that’s this well-established and this sophisticated, that I can get out a magic wand wave and it’ll all be OK in five months.
“This is a tough job. It will take time to do it, it will take good operational cooperation, good cross-border policing.”
