Ten months on a government with a large majority presides over record levels of illegal migration by small boat. They watch as if powerless observers as thousands more chance their lives to get here on illegal dangerous overloaded small craft. Why?
They scrapped the Rwanda plan which was starting to deter illegal travellers. They have offered friendship and money to France only to see the French accompany boats to the middle of the Channel . In France migrants survive in tents, freely talk of getting an illegal boat to England and make contact with the people smugglers.GB News showed all this on Tuesday in good reporting.
The UK offering to rescue people at sea and to ferry them to hotels, often leading on to their establishing a right to stay even though they came here illegally encourages this evil trade.
Why doesn’t the UK arrest and prosecute the men who organise and steer the boats to the UK? Why don’t officials mystery shop for boat transport so they know where and when boats will leave? Why cant they find out who takes the money? Why cant the French authorities stop boats putting to sea? Why hasn’t France traced the supply of new boats to the traders?
Why are the standards of accommodation and treatment for illegal migrants so different in the two countries? How can France be abiding by the same Human Rights law which demands much higher standards in England?
Why does France tolerate so many illegals near the coast, and allow so many small boats to launch? It must be quite obvious which inflatable is an illegal people smuggling boat by the number of people assembling to go on it.
May 15, 2025
We have to face the fact that’s its n ‘agreed trade’. I would not be surprised to find the money the U.K. gives to France is mot funding the actual boats. Where are the thousands of craft that beach in Britain? Where are they? I want to see the remains because otherwise I believe they are deliberately returned to France for another load.
These ‘small boats’ put The Dunkirk evactations to shame.
Why is the RNLI not prosecuted every time they land illegal people in this country – they are ‘people smuggling’ and part of the ‘gang that must be smashed’. Why don’t they stop the small boats crossing the mid-line and force them to return?
We all know the answer and must face it.
May 15, 2025
Agreed Lynn. The questions from Sir John are valid, sensible, have been asked for years.. and have never been properly answered. We need to accept the UK and French Governments want this dangerous and illegal practice to continue. The French benefit as the migrants are no longer their problem. The important question for today is what does the UK Government get from this?
May 15, 2025
Some economists believe the UK government needs more immigrants to help keep its demographic Ponzi scheme going. Plus many UK politicians dislike the white indigenous population and would prefer to replace it.
May 15, 2025
I came to the conclusion a very long time ago that this is a desired trade.
No need to search for these elusive, dare I say mythical ‘gangs’ if you get my meaning!!
Living in the area of the landing sites, I do believe the dinghies are taken and kept in a yard nearby.
I can only speculate as to what happens after that.
May 15, 2025
they should be destroyed after emptying their human cargo.
May 15, 2025
@Michelle; “I do believe the dinghies are taken and kept in a yard nearby.”
For pity sake! Of course they are, just as the police retain any evidence related to a crime, ‘Exhibit A m’ Lord, members of the Jury,’…
May 15, 2025
Jerry
Courts don’t require objects like a large boat to be brought into a courtroom.
A simple photo or video will suffice.
As long as both defence and prosecution agree.
Which they do.
Otherwise cars buildings and even ships would be retained as evidence.
May 15, 2025
Just to add…this is only if there is an actual prosecution and court case which in the example of immigration via a dingy from France there are none.
May 16, 2025
@MiB; “A simple photo or video will suffice.”
True, but the evidence still needs to be retained, and sometimes it is retained for a considerable time (that is how new evidence comes about, such as new DNA recovered), sometimes much to the distress of relatives even bodies can’t be buried.
In any case there is no proof, only conspiracy theory, that the UK authorities return these inflatable boast to France when they are not required as evidence. Stop blowing Dog Whistles!
May 16, 2025
Did you read my second post Jerry?
PS
Your second paragraph is a mystery to me because I’ve not said anything about whether these boats get returned.
May 16, 2025
@MiB; You appear easily mystified, or perhaps not…
That second paragraph was in reply to your second post, there is no way to reply to that comment directly as there is no option, nor was there any real need to add another quote. As for your confusion, you were replying within a thread were the original comment post made the claim that boats are sent back to France. Whatever.
May 17, 2025
Well I’m even more baffled now Jerry !
May 15, 2025
+1 Lynn. Even as an occasional seafarer, I no longer support the RLNI.
May 15, 2025
The RLNI crew members cannot be volunteers. This is a full-time job, and someone must be paying for them. Who are these men? Where have they come from? Donations to RLNI must have dried up long ago, as I can’t believe anybody in their right mind would give their hard-earned money to such a traitorous organisation. Follow the money.
May 15, 2025
An RNLI collector was standing in my local town earlier this week … and being ignored by the vast majority of people in the High Street.
May 15, 2025
As a boat owner, I was a member of the RNLI for 40 years but cancelled my membership in protest over the organisation picking up migrants by arrangement in mid-channel and bringing them to the UK.
Everyone who is against the boats crossing to our shores should resign from the RNLI in protest.
May 15, 2025
They can’t intercept the boats at the mid-line because it is dangerous to do so. They may be illegals but they haven’t committed a capital offence.
Return them to France and they will just try again. Better to take them to a detention camp where they have nothing to do and not allowed to go anywhere but good porridge to eat, until they get fed up and ask to be returned to their country of origin. When it’s seen that coming to the UK without a valid visa is futile the flow will stop.
Sorry we can’t provide heating in the detention camp as we’re supposed to be saving the planet.
May 15, 2025
D.A. The thing is we do not have vast detention capacity. The proposed new detention centre in France, as part of the 2023 megabucks funding to France we never hear much about. It was originally stated that it would not be in operation until 2026. So how is that coming along I wonder.
May 15, 2025
I think that might just work.
May 15, 2025
Agreed Lynn it is an “agreed trade”, these illegals search out the boat suppliers who are simply feeding a demand.
The Mayor of Calais has been saying for years, the UK needs to stop the pull factor, and you will stop the trade, he is also absolutely fed up with all of these illegals camping and trashing his Town, but when you can get so much for free in the UK which you cannot in the rest of Europe or France, the demand is self made.
We holiday in France most years, usually via Calais Port or Tunnel, we have seen the Jungle tent camp, have seen the miles and miles of fencing (paid for by the UK) so the Illegals now simply go to the open beaches and other areas.
The solution is in our own Governments hands, but they do not have a clue about human nature, which is why so many of their policies fail. STOP THE PULL FACTOR AND YOU WILL STOP THE PROBLEM.
May 15, 2025
The RNLI are assisting the illegal business, the boats have set sail overloaded, often in hazardous sea conditions. They intentionally put themselves at a level of risk. The RNLI need to announce that they will no longer set off to ferry the fare paying passengers across the Channel.
May 15, 2025
@LA; So the scapegoat is now the RNLI, what do you suggest such dedicated life savers do, and if you prosecute the RNLI for rescuing undocumented people how might that affect those landed after ship wrecks, should the charity have to cease operations. Yes I know it is visually clear that the two are not the same but knee-jerk laws are often blind to nuances, you only need to look at the mess the Dangerous Dogs Act has become.
May 15, 2025
Agree Jerry, but are they actually called out as an emergency, or are they put on stand-by
I no longer contribute to the RNLI, as good a charity as it is, and I have told them the reason, I am not funding new equipment when it is being worked out to provide a taxi service to illegal (criminals) I wonder if the Government give them a payment ?
It must be costing the Crew member volunteers a fortune being on constant call out, especially if you are self employed !
It is wrong to use the RNLI like this for so many reasons.
May 16, 2025
@BA; Your choice whether to donate or not, I seem to recall there was a UK Tabloid ‘newspaper’ that suggested people stop donating, the aftermath was the RNLI actually saw an increase in donations…
A life is still a life…
May 15, 2025
But we have a Border Force, the French have their Police Force and UK paid coast monitoring staff.
Communications take place in order for the UK to collect the illegals at a midway point. Sometimes the French help the boat in trouble proceed to be met by RNLI or Border Force!
Is there no French equivalent of RNLI to rescue and take back the boats? If there is, it doesn’t!
May 16, 2025
@MT; “Communications take place in order for the UK to collect the illegals at a midway point.”
Indeed, but I think you will find the illegal migrants use a ‘burner phone’, provided by the smugglers.
“French help the boat in trouble proceed to be met by RNLI or Border Force!”
If the traffic was in the opposite direction would the UK government stop the exodus of illegal migrants, and if they did, what do you think UK verdict would be?
May 16, 2025
SNSM: Societe Nationale de Sauvetage en Mer (the French ‘RNLI’)
5 stations, 6 boats between Dunkirk and Boulogne.
1300 migrants aided and brought back to French shore in 2023, 4838 in 2024.
Lavoixdunord.fr 10/02/2025
May 15, 2025
Actually these illegal crossing are in many ways safer than some legitimate crossings. As someone who used to fish off a small boat mid-Channel I remember how careful our skipper had to be not to get too close to shipping lanes. We would have felt a lot safer with RNLI or RN vessels escorting us.
May 15, 2025
Good morning.
Because they are in the safe country of France (and others) and are outside British jurisdiction. That is why when the PM, and the past PM’s, were lying when they said they would tackle the ‘gangs’, they can’t and they know it.
The ONLY solution is to return them straight back to France or, if not, to a remote Scottish Island. Deterrents work !
The French tolerate the former because they know they will not stay. As soon as we start sending the straight back they will do something.
I said before and I will say it again – The UK Government have agreed to ‘take its fair share’ of immigrants. It’s obvious.
Reply The whole point is the boat drivers come to the UK!
May 15, 2025
The whole point is that you’re missing the point!
May 15, 2025
R to R
Sir John
It is a case of, ‘Supply and demand’. Whether they be drivers or not it is the passengers that are driving the trade. Going after the gangs simply is a deflection tactic designed to divert our attention away from those crossing.
No illegals, no trade and no boat crossings. It is that simple. It has nothing to do with ‘drivers’ or gangs.
May 15, 2025
One only needs to look at how well “smashing the drugs gangs” has worked over recent decades.
May 15, 2025
reply to reply…Each ‘driver’ should immediately be sent to an unsympathetic prison on a 10 year sentence.
May 15, 2025
@Reply – why haven’t the ‘driver’s’ been prosecuted? It is the UK Government and its Parliament that is aiding this criminal activity no one else.
May 15, 2025
If France detered the immigrsnts leaving their shores then fewer might arrive in France.
May 15, 2025
The “boat drivers” themselves claim asylum, they are not part of the organising gangs. In any event there’s no need to “drive” the boats because they get towed in by the RNLI once they are in British waters so on what basis could you arrest them ? For driving a boat in French waters – that’s not illegal. This is just “smash the gangs” rhetoric and equally ineffective.
May 15, 2025
All good points but did anyone expect Starmer’s Labour to really even attempt to smash the gangs? It was just another lie – like his “we won’t increase NI or taxes, we won’t tax working people, or the IHT on farms theft, or pensioner heating allowance…”
The boat people will keep coming – and more and more will do so unless you have some deterrents that make it not worth their while to come. Starmer clearly prefers ever more incentives for them to come while paying the French, Border Force, the Lifeboat service, Capita, Doctors, Dentists and Lawyers to assist and further incentivise them.
May 15, 2025
Allister Heath today.
“For 30 years, at every election, Labour and the Conservatives pledged to reduce immigration, and then did the opposite. Far from feeling any contrition, let alone apologising, many of these politicians, convinced of their superior morality and grasp of economics, seemed proud to defy a “bigoted” electorate.”
This not the only fraudulent pledge they promised lower tax and better public service and deliver the reverse despite the vast improvements in technology, they said the covid Vaccines were “safe and effective”, they promised lower crime, cheaper energy, a decent justice system…
May 15, 2025
Plus they coerced the net harm Covid vaccines into people (several and mixed types for good measure each) into people who clearly never even needed them even had they been “safe and effective”. Young people, people who had had covid earlier etc. This under the “expert” guidance of organisations, experts and regulators funded largely by Big Pharma and influenced by them. Many of these people now in the Lords or government positions.
Similar parallel with the net zero insanity! We are clearly governed by crooks, the compromised or group think idiots.
May 15, 2025
Illegals crossing the Channel helps solve France’s problem. France aids and abeta the whole process.
They come because we incentivise the whole process with relative reward when they get here. There are those in our present government, legal system, and civil service , intent on the destruction of UK culture and see immigration as a major tool in their box. After the GBNewa expose on Tuesday, any doubt on the part of the UK electorate should disappeare. The only answer is a great reset of UK politics in 2029 or an earlier implosion.
May 15, 2025
Let’s not blame the French for the UK policy of attracting migrants in with free everything. Let’s be fair on the French who are quite prepared to suspend human rights law on their eastern border trying to keep them out. Of course this isn’t reported in the Anglophone MSM.
May 15, 2025
Unfortunately, the Conservatives and every other party in the Commons, apart from Reform, is complicit in the trade, despite the overwhelming proportion of voters wanting it brough to a halt ASAP.
Can anyone tell me why our government is not insisting that the renegotiation of French fishing licences be linked to the French stopping the boats ? This seems so obvious. Stop the boats, Macron, or no licences for your fishing boats.
May 15, 2025
Britain need a new restoration video – David Starkey it certainly does but will we ever get one?
May 15, 2025
I saw some of Patrick Christie’s expose. What has stuck in my mind was the response of one of the Calais warehouse campers. He said the reason he is going to England, is “because it’s perfect, they give you everything you want, even a house!”
May 15, 2025
I still believe there is some secret Brexit deal where we agreed to take our fair share of migrants. The French could stop the boat people immediately bit it is in their interest not too.
Then we have organisations like Care4Calais which should be a proscribed organisation actively helping and encouraging this criminal behaviour.
Now the PM is being targeted no doubt by a fifth columnist some action will be taken but I won’t hold my breath. We will never know the identity as they tried to suppress the Southport choir boy as it will be bad for community cohesion.
etc ed
May 15, 2025
Why? Because for 20 years we have had weak, inept politicians who were more interested in their global status than they were about the British people. The effect of mass immigration, legal or otherwise, does not affect these politicians. They live in their nice suburban homes, have good salaries with Taxpayers expenses, use mostly private healthcare and don’t travel on public transport. They are in their bubble, ignoring the affect that failed multiculturalism has on the majority of citizens. Loss of services, increased crime rates, fear of walking the streets in their own towns. This is why Reform have flourished, they and only they are fighting for the People.
May 15, 2025
Well said. I can only laugh at the hypocrisy that spews from many in politics/media and the general gaggle of champagne socialist types.
They hitch their wagons and move out in droves when ‘diversity’ affects their world.
May 15, 2025
Yes the King found it ‘challenging’ apparently. Although he has the unique view that ‘multi-culturalism’ won the Second World War.
May 15, 2025
I suppose people living in tents produce less carbon than people living in several palaces. Perhaps the King could give it a try to demonstrate his “commitment” to the mad war on plant food.
May 15, 2025
William Smith:
You are 100% correct!
May 15, 2025
Morning Sir John,
For me, the dinghy is a metaphor for the UK.
Both are over crowded and in danger of sinking.
The difference though, lies in the helms of the boat and the Good Ship UK :The dinghy helm believes in the UK and wants to get away from the EU whereas, the helm of the UK seems to want to drag those in the Good Ship UK back towards the EU.
May 15, 2025
The boats will keep coming for as long as the UK accepts that someone who has crossed many safe countries without claiming asylum is a genuine refugee when they get here. We should pass whatever legislation is necessary so that we can reject all illegal immigration from France. In the unlikely event that a boater is a genuine refugee they have had numerous opportunities to claim asylum, if they are lying to be allowed to live here that’s an indication of how good a citizen they will be.
May 15, 2025
Theresa May signed the UN Migration Pact which agrees to treat economic migrants as refugees and to assist migration. This is what the civil service and lawyers such as Starmer and his Attorney General activist never elected friend follow. They are only pretending to change track now because of the recent elections.
May 15, 2025
Make the UK a less attractive place for the migrants and they will go elsewhere. The problem is the appalling French president Macron, who could easily stop the boat people. Still smarting over Brexit and losing the AUKUS submarine contact, he refuses to do so.
May 15, 2025
Who are you, and what have you done to our, Sakara Gold ? He/she/it never talks such sense.
May 15, 2025
If bungling Boris had managed to negotiate a favourable Brexit deal, re-negotiation would not be necessary. Those negotiating the Brexit agreement were up against very clever and experienced EU negotiators, led by M Barnier. Unfortunately, we had Govey and his lordship, who were completely outclassed.
May 15, 2025
SG
Recollections may vary
I seem to recall Mp’s voted to veto a simple leave and WTO deal, I remember some our Politicians going to the EU to appeal to them to give us a lousy deal, I remember a certain Mr Ben’s Bill that excluded us walking away.
If you want to blame people, look at Cameron, May and the rest of the Remainers, who deliberately set out to keep us tied to the EU, against the majority of the peoples wishes.
May 15, 2025
The EU would not budge an inch, so Cameron et al have all been let down and punish UK at every opportunity.
We must pull up the drawbridge of cooperation at every involvement., including plans for any military support.
Isolation to be welcomed while we watch the collapse of the little protection racket.
May 15, 2025
You may recall that before the EU referendum David Cameron let it be understood that if we voted to leave the EU, against his strong advice, then he would nonetheless stay on as Prime Minister and see us safely out. Then when we voted the wrong way he promptly went back on that and announced that he was standing down. A number of senior Tories were considered to replace him but it was Theresa May who successfully put herself forward to take over and lead us out the EU. Unfortunately it gradually became apparent that she did not see her role as fighting on our behalf in negotiations with the EU but more acting as a kind of intermediary and at least as much on their side as on ours. That is why we ended up with Boris Johnson as Prime Minister, but with his hands largely tied by the unnecessary concessions that Theresa May had already made. We had a decent hand but she threw away some of our strongest cards. As part of her reward is she is now Baroness May.
May 15, 2025
‘call me Dave’ also promptly abandoned the people of his constituency!
Toys thrown out of the pram.
May 15, 2025
The damage was already done by the time Boris became PM.
Bercow and the Remainers in the Commons did everything they could to sabotage negotiations which were doomed anyway by the naive stupidity of Teresa May and her “negotiator” Ollie Robbins.
Despite all the evidence of years of watching Brussels pull every stroke in the book to get their own way, she still thought that they would negotiate in good faith. Brussels doesn’t even understand the meaning of the term.
Think back to everything that went on : as soon as the Remainers, led on by Bercow, prevented us from leaving with no deal, (my preferred option), we had nothing left to negotiate with.
May 15, 2025
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/10/election-nicky-morgan-theresa-hard-brexit
“The Observer has learned that May took the fateful decision to call the election having been urged to do so by commission president Jean-Claude Juncker.
[Picture of Juncker with his hand on May’s shoulder]
“It is understood that Juncker had advised May to call an early general election as a result of his concerns that the 17-seat majority she had inherited from David Cameron would not be enough during the pinch points of the negotiations, including over the issue of the UK’s divorce bill, estimated to be as much as €100bn.”
May 15, 2025
How depressing … looking for something else I find I followed you six years ago, March 8 2019:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2019/03/08/will-the-government-set-out-all-the-good-news-of-what-we-can-do-once-we-have-left-the-eu/#comment-1001330
“It started off with “Brexit means Brexit”, now it’s threats that she will arrange for Wrexit – Brexit stopped altogether – unless MPs agree to the rubbish ‘deal’ that she negotiated once she had decided to use the largely fabricated problem of the Irish land border as a pretext for giving the CBI what they want for the convenience of about 6% of UK businesses exporting about 12% of GDP to the EU. Whether or not MPs give in to her threats she has shown us what she and her party are really like.”
May 15, 2025
A renegotiation ISN’T necessary – our total exports to the EU are at an all-time high. What’s the problem ?
May 16, 2025
@Roy Grainger
Rubbish. The UK’s recent trade performance in services has been much better than that for goods. UK goods exports to the EU fell sharply in January 2021 after the end of the Brexit transition period, before recovering strongly in February 2021. Goods exports to the EU remain below their pre-pandemic/Brexit level. However: in 2024, goods exports to the EU were 18% below their 2019 level in real terms. It is important to point out, however, that goods exports to the EU were growing slowly before Brexit and the pandemic. In addition, exports to non-EU countries in 2024 were also 14% below their 2019 level in real terms. Source; ONS
Reply Leading goods exports have been oil, oil products and petrochem, diesel and petrol cars. Government policy is to run down and ban these items.
May 15, 2025
No exit deal was required. Had Johnson-the-destroyer done NOTHING, no renegotiation would be necessary.
But he refused to do what we told him to do so he messed up – again.
May 15, 2025
If the boats contained would-be Reform voters, the government would stop them.
If the boats contained entrepreneurial millionaires seeking to escape France, the French would stop them.
If we (the West) hadn’t tried “spreading democracy” by armed force to countries from Libya to Afghanistan, utterly destabilising them in the process, the boat trade would never have flourished.
May 15, 2025
A large reason is the pull factor of what we offer. The below is what we permit every illegal migrant who enters the UK:
We pick them up shortly after leaving Calais and escort them to the UK so there is no need for them to even cross the Channel. Then they automatically get:
Housing
A flat, house, hostel or bed and breakfast.
Cash support
£49.18 for each person in your household. This will help you pay for things you need like food, clothing and toiletries. Your allowance will be loaded onto a debit card (ASPEN card) each week. You’ll be able to use the card to get cash from a cash machine.
£8.86 for each person in your household for food. You’ll get extra money to buy healthy food if you’re pregnant or a mother of a child aged 3 or under.
You can apply for a one-off £300 maternity payment if your baby is due in 11 weeks or less, or if your baby is under 6 months old.
Healthcare
You may get free National Health Service (NHS) healthcare, such as to see a doctor or get hospital treatment.
You’ll also get:
free prescriptions for medicine
free dental care for your teeth
free eyesight tests
help paying for glasses
Education
Your children must attend school if they are aged 5 to 17. All state schools are free and your children may be able to get free school meals.
https://www.gov.uk/asylum-support/what-youll-get
We are unbelievable! They should all be held in detention centres and genuine refugees can stay until their domestic issues are safe again (subject to a cap! with the surplus being sent to Albania) and the rest should all be repatriated to wherever they came from.
May 15, 2025
They also get free family unification support, which saves them tens of thousands of pounds compared to what legal immigrants to the UK have to pay. Coming to the UK illegally is by far the cheapest route.
May 15, 2025
Wouldn’t it be a good idea if the citizens of the UK could have all the items mentioned above under Healthcare and Housing? You know – just like all the other countries in the World provide.
May 15, 2025
Paul
Yes it’s the Pull Factor, all set out in black and white for anyone who wants to take advantage of the UK taxpayer.
May 15, 2025
My son a junior doctor had less than £49 a week disposable last year after his rent for a room in a shared flat in London when working hard for over 40 hours per week including night work!
May 15, 2025
How many gangs gave been smashed? A hundred? Ten? None? And what difference has it made?
May 15, 2025
The only decent financial quid pro quo would be for the UK to contribute a lot of money to stopping the flow through Turkey or across the Mediterranean in return for the EU (i.e. France) stopping them cross the Channel.
May 15, 2025
Resolving this problem. requires guts. Small inflatables should be punctured when encountered by Border Force. The occupants are then rescued and provided with a replacement vessel (BF have thousands they have taken from migrants) and then told to return to France – and that the boats are tagged and will be sunk again, without rescue, if found in UK waters. A few of these interventions and the crossings would cease.
May 15, 2025
My solution would include taking them 12 miles off the French coast much further South, where the UK coast was 100 miles away and only sufficient fuel for 20 miles.
May 15, 2025
or even north to the coast of Belgium where we can deposit them….the Belgians will accept them as asylum seekers.
May 15, 2025
There is a similar theme on here, and one you will hear from ordinary people up and down the land.
Stop the pull factor.
It’s that simple. There is no mystery about it.
All the questions raised in the article are questions the public have been asking of governments past and present for far too long. It is that which is leading many to come to the conclusion that the whole establishment is actually in on it. It’s a policy to bring in these people.
Rwanda was a bit of tinkering. One that Conservatives must have known would face every blocking tactic from Labour/Lords and assorted charities, human rights bods.
So it was laborious, and extremely costly and even if allowed to proceed I very much doubt it would have had the effect needed to put an end to all this.
I will also remind people, as I was reminded the other day by someone very much in the know, that while everyone is concentrating on the numbers in the boats, there are still many coming across in lorries.
I believe a poor lorry driver not too long ago found a group in the back of his lorry, did the right thing and called it in only to find himself (or his firm) slapped with a huge fine.
No wonder some of them don’t report it and let them just wander off.
May 15, 2025
Michelle
And don’t forget those who wonder off the beaches in Kent and wander off to the road, to be collected by a waiting van! Locals see that a lot, apparently.
May 15, 2025
“Why doesn’t the UK arrest and prosecute the men who organise and steer the boats to the UK?” because the organisers are in France and the boats have no “captain”, they are all asylum seekers. More to the point why doesn’t UK withdraw all French fishing rights until they stop the boats launching ?
Reply The person powering and steering the boat is an organiser. Someone has to check all have paid.
May 15, 2025
reply to reply …it must be possible to trace the bank transfers to the gangs – accounts should be closed.
May 15, 2025
How the traffic is organised (sorry, in French)
– francetvinfo.fr 23/09/2024 ‘Ils ne veulent que notre argent: Qui sont les passeurs qui organisent les traversees des migrants dans la Manche?’
– infomigrants.net 26/02/2024 ‘Royaume-Uni: 9 ans de prison pour un Senegalais qui ‘pilotait un canot’ dans la Manche’.
– sudouest.fr 15/04/2022 ‘Traversees clandestines de la Manche: des reseaux de passeurs de plus en plus organises’.
– ouest-france.fr 26/11/2021 ‘Migrants: a €3000 ou €6000 la traversee, ces reseaux qui s’enrichissent par millions d’euros’.
And contrary to what Sir John thinks
– the organisers are not in the small boats,
– they are likely to organise the traffic safely from ‘offices’ in France, Belgium, Germany or the UK,
– the boats are imported from China to Belgium, Germany and France,
– the money is paid in advance (‘hawala’) often for the whole trip from Turkey, Libya, Morocco to the UK,
– not so often and only when there is a specific ‘guarantor’ money is paid from the UK once the crossing has been successful,
– the pilots’ are most of the time whoever can be coerced to do it,
Etcetera …
On a problem so serious, a bit of seriousness would help not go astray.
Reply The organisers in offices need to control the timing and access to the boats and ensure someone operates the boat
May 15, 2025
Reply-Reply
It is reported often that the so called skipper of the boat is also an illegal, who usually gets a discount on the trip.
The smuggling gangs are not stupid enough to steer the boats themselves.!
Reply The skipper has clearly aided the small boat organisers, knows them and needs to check with someone about payments
May 15, 2025
Reply – reply
Do you know this for a fact ?
I think you are thinking this through too much John, you can see the White Cliffs of Dover from the French beaches
Once in the water and headed out to sea, we are given to understand (film record) the French then ESCORT them across to Halfway (to make sure they are ok up top that point), then radio our lot to take them onwards to the UK from the halfway point.
I think you will find the money is not collected by the “Skipper” because they would then still have the money on them when “rescued”. Proof if any was then needed, that he was actually involved in the organisation..
Afraid the illegals always appear one step ahead of the officials who do not seem to like getting their feet wet.
To stop traffic on the completely fenced in dual lane main approach roads to the PORTS, they simply let loose a free running dog to two. Thus traffic stopped and they broke into lorries, caravans and the like whilst stuck in the traffic jams, and YES we have actually seen this happening whilst stuck stationary.
Reply If someone starts the motor and steers the boat they are the master and are committing a whole series of offences. They must know the trip organiser
May 16, 2025
Sorry John but you are thinking in simple legal terms, and not with a criminal type mind set.
No I am not a criminal, but I live in the real world, and have had friends and family members who have worked in the Police, and in Prisons, and it’s a different World mindset out there to the one most of us try to live by.
Suppose they all take a share in holding the tiller, are they all skippers ?
May I suggest that the bloke with the tiller does so under the simple threat to his families live’s.
Reply They are all criminals seeking illegal entry to UK , assisting an illegal boat on an unlicenced journey, paying money to criminals which will be laundered and will dodge taxes .
May 16, 2025
I absolutely agree, they all are all illegals/criminals, but if it is so clear why are we (the legal system) not treating them as criminals, instead we seem to be dancing around on the head of a pin, with a whole range of descriptions/excuses for not prosecuting them for what they are, and at the same time paying for legal aid to help them evade, or bend the law to their own advantage.
Why can they get legal aid, yet as a citizen of this country I cannot ?
May 15, 2025
Try proving which one is the organiser ! You can bet that the person put on the tiller is not him !
Why can’t we link fishing licences to stopping the boats ?
May 15, 2025
Once escorted into British waters by the French, outside UK’s jurisdiction, the small boats are powered and steered by the RNLI who tow them in. So are they “organisers” too ?
May 15, 2025
Reply to reply. Maybe, but you’d think they have some “heavies” to make sure no-one who hasn’t paid gets anywhere near the boat. Then they can just start the engine and tell a passenger to follow a compass north. Maybe the guy steering gets a discount…
Reply There still is someone driving the boat that passengers rely on. He is committing many offences including running an illegal service, operating a boat for someone else to profit with illegal money, endangering peoples lives at sea, driving an overloaded boat, driving without a licence etc. Plenty of reasons to arrest them
May 15, 2025
But the French have no intention of arresting anyone !
Until we tell them no fishing licences will be renewed until you stop the boats we will get nowhere.
Why is it so difficult !!!!!!!!
May 15, 2025
Macron and the French want the immigrants to leave. So stand by idly watching as the boats are loaded. Here the immigrants are treated like royalty, they use their free phones to tell their pals back in France ‘get the next boat across’ it really is nirvana here. You’ll be housed, fed, given money (and phones) get access to the NHS, and it really is free. After a few months, the authorities in England will accept your manufactured asylum claim and you get residency with a bonus of paid for social housing.
Now ask why they keep coming …………….
May 15, 2025
“Why are the standards of accommodation and treatment for illegal migrants so different in the two countries?”
Is it not the case that accommodating illegals in hotels was originally only supposed to be a temporary measure if the Manston processing centre was full, thereby to provide the same standards as Manston? Could it be that ministers and civil servants were asleep on watch when the increased arrival of stowaways originally led Manston to become full, and then buried their heads in the sand in the face of obvious abuse from the Channel cruise parties, preferring to cover the problem up until it was too late? A responsible government would repeal that legislation now, and have the illegals transferred to secure tented barracks.
May 15, 2025
The only answer I can think of is that the previous government and current government don’t have the stomach to stand up to the extremists and weirdos in the Home Office and in other parts of the civil service.
So-called Border Force is a good example of a department which the government appears to have lost control of.
May 15, 2025
correct.
May 15, 2025
The Governments advertisement or ‘shout out’ to the whole World – is this a deterrent or a welcome?
https://www.gov.uk/asylum-support/what-youll-get
What you’ll get …
You can ask for somewhere to live, a cash allowance or both as an asylum seeker.
Housing…
You’ll be given somewhere to live if you need it. This could be in a flat, house, hostel or bed and breakfast.
Cash support…
You’ll usually get £49.18 for each person in your household. This will help you pay for things you need like food, clothing and toiletries.
If you’ve been refused asylum but you’re still eligible for support
You’ll be given:
• somewhere to live
• £49.18 per person on a payment card for food, clothing and toiletries
The there is the child grants and maternity grant and much more….
Not forgetting helping the French supply life jackets etc as you board your boat, who will then chaperone you from their waters to be handed over to the UK’s English Channel taxi service who have been informed of your arrival in advance. Criminal activity aided and abetted by the UK Taxpayer, so they will just keep coming..
May 15, 2025
Sir John
As we know this is not on Sir Kier Starmer’s agenda he is too busy setting his stall out for his Boss our new Leader Ursula von der Leyen and clearing his desk for the Orders she will give him.
Politician’s at that level do not meet at that level other than for a photo-op on a done deal. Their minions have at that stage sorted all the nitty-gritty
May 15, 2025
The Rwanda scheme was heading in the right direction but I suspect that it was deliberately set up to fail to show that there is no alternative to the present policy of allowing anybody who arrives here to stay.
I previously suggested that we could use Ascension Island for a basic but humane holding camp where asylum claims could be processed, but we also have the Falklands with an area of 4700 square miles:
https://www.falklandislands.com/our-islands
I notice that the EU has been edging in the same general direction:
https://www.boell.de/en/2024/10/15/migration-policy-european-union-increasingly-outsources-responsibility-asylum
“Migration Policy: European Union Increasingly Outsources Responsibility for Asylum”
May 15, 2025
Denis, I know Ascension Island very well, having over the past years on and off lived and worked there many times. The island has no water, other than that derived from fossil fuelled reverse osmosis. The main accommodation sites of Georgetown, Two Boats village and the RAF accommodation site at Traveller’s Hill are fully occupied. There is only one area on this rugged volcanic island where it might be possible to construct the accommodation needed for processing illegal immigrants from the UK and that is on Donkey Plain – but it is remote from any sources of energy, water and drainage. To develop it for the accommodation needed would be hugely expensive and perhaps unachievable in any sensible timescale. Ascension has no harbour, so shipping carrying supplies for the island have to an anchor offshore to deliver their cargo via lighter to be craned the shore at the pier head.
Similar considerations apply for the Falkland Islands, where vast tracts of it are uninhabitable. In short, neither Ascension Island nor the Falkland Islands are in any way suitable for acting as holding and screening stations for illegal immigrants.
Reply I think tge last government was told of
the impracticalities and ultra high cost of trying to use Ascension when Ministers asked about it.
May 16, 2025
Thanks for that. However I think you are rather rushing on from Ascension being impractical to the Falklands also being impractical. Whether the inhabitants would be happy with the proposal is another matter.
May 15, 2025
You would dump 10,000 illegals so far this year on the small island and it’s legal inhabitants.?
Even flying them there would be quite a challenge.
May 16, 2025
No, I would send the new arrivals there. Once it was clear that illegal immigrants would not be stopping here, they would be straight on a plane to a camp on a remote island where their claims would be processed, the numbers coming would drop dramatically.
May 15, 2025
The UK is now number 7 in the nanny state index – with such an attitude to life and freedoms is it any wonder that illegals continue to come here in such vast numbers?
In any case, They are all convinced that “British people are rich and should (it is their duty to) pay for immigrants to have a good life here.” – They certainly don’t understand how heavily taxed we are, or how suppressive the laws are, to have the few privileges open to us now.
Is the British government afraid to tackle the smuggling gangs? It would seem so, for in doing so it would go against their passions for freedom of movement, full on globalism and the ruination of the Christian state.
Arab states breed much faster than the west, their population growth is not sustainable, but just because they cannot control or manage that population growth it shouldn’t mean that it becomes our problem. With a PM and a political establishment that believes in internationalism we will always see others benefitting while Britain suffers.
Smashing the smuggling gangs would certainly help our situation, but what about the problems we already have due to mass migration. They will not go away, and are unlikely to get better on their own. How many of us have actually woken up to what Enoch Powell was talking about in his famous speech?
May 15, 2025
Politics changed tangibly in 1990 IMHO when TV came to Parliament. Previously MPs voices were important now image is everything (BBC controlled) and attracts unfortunately, many vain shallow thinkers instead of the more solid real world experienced characters previously.
The weekly PMQs is much wasted as the most important topics are deflected by cheap put downs in favour of allowing several of the 600+ MPs their few minutes of attention sadly.
That’s why this blog is so vital many thanks SJR.
May 15, 2025
Why are the standards of accommodation and treatment for illegal migrants so different in the two countries? How can France be abiding by the same Human Rights law which demands much higher standards in England?
Has no MP ever rabled that as a Parliamentary question? I should be interested to hear the answer.
May 15, 2025
This government is all for immigration from wherever from the Blair days so what is new? I don’t know what our young people will think when they have completely changed this country (many towns are already changed beyond recognition). Please wake up young people and start the fight back. Write to your MPs telling them of your fears for your futures. We are in the stranglehold of unethical people at present but it won’t last if you vote for the people who value this country. Find out who they are and take your country back.
May 15, 2025
These invaders could be kicked out as soon as they arrive, except that this government and the previous one do not want to do this.
There is absolutely no need to withdraw from ECHR or anything else, because Denmark successfully kick illegals out, and they are in EU and ECHR, but have a government of patriots who are for the Danish people.
May 15, 2025
From an outfit calling its self part of the MsM(DM)
‘Keir Starmer will pay for drone patrols in the Balkans as part of desperate bid to stop migrants reaching the English Channel.’
The correction isn’t there, 2TK will pay for ‘nothing’ the over burdened UK Taxpayer will pay for everything. But at best it is more deflection while all the time 2TK is advertising on the World Wide Web the benefits to the criminal invasion of the UK.
May 15, 2025
I think it is clear that tackling the gangs, giving more money to police the situation, giving money to the French police, assisting boats to enter UK waters, returning boats to France so more migrants can make the crossing etc has never ever been successful as they still keep on coming and the situation is worsening.The Rwanda policy doesn’t seem to work either.
The question is why do they so desperately want to reach the UK and risk their lives doing so and how do we tackle the root cause of this problem.
Why don’t they stay in France/Europe where they’re safe and save the money they would be paying to the traffickers.
It must surely be that the UK provides a much safer haven than Europe does.In the Uk they are given money, clothes,accommodation,NHS,free schooling for their children, are eligible to apply for jobs within 3/6 months and generally acquire the same benefits as those who have been living here for most of their lives.
The rules for illegal immigrants must therefore be toughened up so as to deter them from crossing the Channel in the first place.They see the Uk as a soft touch; if you make the UK less attractive than say France/Germany/Italy,then they won’t come here anymore.That in turn will put the traffickers out of business and the border forces can then concentrate on other things than spending their time policing the Channel for illegal immigrants.
May 15, 2025
Sir John is right, we need to arrest the skipper and bail him for the value of the boat ie £10k per passenger.
Once the couriers were doing it for nothing it would stop. We could then use the money to hire them to return with full boats.
May 15, 2025
It has been documented for some months now starting in summer 2024 that some small boats start not from the sea shore but in rivers/canals a few kilometres inland as to avoid the police patrols. Due to police realising this, it appears there are now boats being filled up to 10 kms from the shore, eg, on the Yser (Belgium), the Aa river (between Calais and Dunkirk), the Slack river and the Wimereux river (near Boulogne). The French police were originally patrolling the Calais area, then were redistributed between the French-Belgian border and Boulogne (75 km), now the area covered is more than 100 kms from north of Nieuwpoort (B) to at least Boulogne with at least four areas inland.
May 15, 2025
Our government should simply give them nothing when illegal mirgants have had their asylum claim rejected just turn them out onto the streets and let the charities keep them, just as France does.
May 15, 2025
Who isn’t sick and tired of this nonsense? We are signed up to a UN obligation which means that we have to take seriously any asylum claims however dubious. Theresa May agreed the UN Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. We have the Human Rights Act on our statute book which gives priority to a European court and protects the Human Rights of felines. Having legally agreed that all can come and all have the law on their side, why pretend to stop their boats from crossing but then accommodate them in hotels when they arrive? The Rwanda scheme was impractical for a variety of reasons.
We need laws that criminalise those who advocate for the flooding of the UK with unassimilable aliens by those themselves that are unassimilable aliens but pretend to be the same as us or in fact better. These people are responsible for all the laws in all countries which discriminate against the native populations and promote the interests of aliens like themselves.
May 15, 2025
I was shocked to see people standing in the water whilst the French police did nothing
Our government is not acting in the national interest just playing to the tune of the EU
I see under this new reset agreement the EU wants contributions from us NO WAY
May 15, 2025
I agree with all the comments. Voters are not stupid; we know a determined Government could have stopped the boats and reduced legal immigration. We have had over 30 years of weak governments that seem to hate the UK and its people. The shocking disrespect for the Brexit result is a perfect example. Without the consent of losers, democracy is doomed. From Brexit, it is crystal clear that 2tk loves the EU and will do anything to get the UK back in and hates democracy. The same applies to too many senior Labour and Conservative MPs, the HOL and the Civil Service.
The question is, how do we, as voters, insist on another General Election now? Our politicians and civil servants have forgotten they are supposed to be the servants of the people, not our masters.
May 16, 2025
I suspect we will have a ” General Strike”. It wont be organized people will just give up. As the country collapses.
May 15, 2025
A couple of points to recall – 2021, the boss of the UK immigration department’s Border Force – ” Bl…y borders are just such a pain in the a.se ” and in 2024, amongst other points raised, a former independent immigration watchdog called UK border protection – “neither effective nor efficient” and saw a sacking of an individual telling a few home truths.
May 15, 2025
Our host asks questions of France, but why should France help the UK find solutions to *our* problems, once the migrants leave French waters they are no longer their problem now we do not wish to find collective answers to common problems, that’s the price of Brexit!
Why is our host not asking the same questions of the North African countries, after all it must be quite obvious which boats and ship are involved an illegal people smuggling by the shear number of people assembling to go on them, far more than ever turn up in the UK I might add.
One other point, why was the Home Office, under the last government, willing to pay Rwanda to construct luxury villas, well the accommodation units shown to the then Home Sec. were all far better than much social housing here in the UK, yet the same government was not willing to spend that money here, where such buildings could later be put to good use (housing those here lawfully) once we and those who countries we wish to truly cooperate with have found solutions to the common problem of illegal immigration and the scourge of the people smugglers.
May 15, 2025
Well Jerry
1 They are our European partners and friends
2 We have paid France hundreds of millions to do something about this problem
3 We are paying hundreds of millions to African countries in overseas aid to reduce the demand people who want to leave
Other than that your post was spot on.
May 16, 2025
@Sam; In response to your bullet points;
1/. But perhaps not after Brexit?
2/. More fool us, our Government responding to yours and others Dog Whistles.
3/. We are also supporting, or not preventing, many of the causes of the exodus from North Africa and elsewhere, not that anyone liked the Libyan regime of old for example. Sometimes a soft regime change is better than a hard one.
May 15, 2025
UNCLOS, the UN Convention and even the ECHR (Art 5) all give UK the egal power to prevent and punish unauthorised entry, arresting the suspect in The Channel beyond UK’s territorial limit. The UK’s Offences against the Person Act 1861 enables UK to arest, charge and imprison the drivers of the boat for endangering human life at sea. The SOLAS treaty requires people whose lives are in danger at sea to be rescued but not to be taken to UK, since this would be further away from the scene than France, from which the people have come. Rescuers should taken to France.
The only difficulty is lack of political will.
May 15, 2025
There is an average of 500 ships per day in the Channel all passing through or along the Dover-Calais crossing, that’s 20 per hour, one every three minutes.
Do I have to understand that the RNLI in between two ships would go from Dover to half the distance in the Channel (about 10 m), collect the migrants and bring them back to France, all that within three minutes? RNLI boats are very rapid but the fastest, the Atlantic 85, has a top speed of 35 kn, 40mph. And then this could not have 40 passengers onboard. That would be a task for the Severn-type boat with max speed of 25 kn, 28 mph.
Furthermore I doubt that the UNCLOS/SOLAS treaties allow ‘arresting the suspect in the Channel beyond UK’s territorial limit’.
Only once in July 2021 did a Border Force boat enter French waters, and once in August 2022 did a RNLI boat did the same. And in both cases it appears to have been a mistake.
May 15, 2025
@Peter D Gardner +1
The Italian PM arriving in office had the boat people pushed back and overnight the volumes trying diminished.
Where there is a will there is a way – the UK Governent & parliament don’t care they see thier work as being deciples of the WEF
May 16, 2025
PM Meloni ‘arriving in office had the boat people pushed back and overnight the volumes trying diminished’. A bit more complicated than that …
PM Meloni worked on it. From November 2023 there were discussions between Italy and Albania ending up with an agreement (bbc.com 29/01/2024 ‘Europe migrant crisis: Albanian court greenlights migration deal with Italy’). She then went to various countries around the Mediterranean and signed agreements with Tunisia and Libya (GBNews 02/01/2025). It cost Italy 100s of millions in aid, trade and investment, and cut illegal migration by 200k.
May 15, 2025
So inspiring!
May 15, 2025
Related: colourful maps from weforum.org 15/02/2024 ‘These are the world’s most vital waterways for global trade’.
May 15, 2025
I’m surprised that no PM has called in our own SIS to investigate the origins and routes of the dhingies and boats from the supplier to depots in France and Europe. Once they are known, perhaps French special forces (or the SAS?) can destroy each one they come across and cut the existing supply routes completely. No boats, no illegals here. Meanwhile, all undocumented new arrivals must be placed in tented compounds, and the hotels and other such accommodations closed down, eventually moving all illegals into tents or back to where they originally came from. What is wrong with this Government? They are worse at it than the previous Tories.
May 15, 2025
Voting records reveal almost one in four Labour MPs dodged the vote for Labour’s Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill – a higher number than at the previous vote. Confirming this Parliament is not a UK Parliament just a shower of freeloaders that have no intention of serving those that empower and pay them.
May 15, 2025
Listen to The Economists “The Intelligence” podcast from early April titled “The business model of migrant-smuggling in the English Channel”. There aren’t “people smuggling gangs” to “smash”, it’s somewhat more complex than a simple soundbite.
May 16, 2025
Starmer now perceived as weak and desperate for anything from tiny Albania to Putin and Xi.
After giving away Chagos (and offering our Billions ££££££s to corrupt Mauritius) for nothing they see a pushover lightweight net zero miles away before he sets off.
The recent local elections confirm what everyone is thinking around the world leaders and all the Teflon coating, mutual ego stroking and find words fail to dust not concrete actions on his mounting challenges.