John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con):
Is the Home Secretary also worried that the criminal gangs that are exploiting people in this dreadful way for great profit may also be linked to other types of serious crime and helping to finance other destabilisation?
Suella Braverman – Minister of State for the Home Office:
I am afraid that my right hon. Friend raises a very worrying fact about what we are seeing. When I have spoken to police chiefs around the country, they tell me that criminalityâparticularly drug supply and usageâis now connected to people who came here illegally on small boats in the first place.
Thirdly, Rwanda is a fundamentally safe country, as affirmed by the High Court. It has a proud track record of helping the worldâs most vulnerable, including refugees, for the United Nations.
March 14, 2023
So letâs ask the obvious question that everyone knows the answer to and have been telling my right honourable friend for a few years now. God save us from politicians. Should the right honourable member ask the Home Secretary is she thinks the dingys are full of air or laughing gas.
March 15, 2023
To conflate, quite deliberately, the criminals from southern European but non-European Union countries – who have merely entered by the same physical manner – with refugees and asylum seekers, is about as low as you can get, but I would expect nothing else of today’s Tories.
March 15, 2023
By definition, if you are arriving from France in a dinghy then you are neither a refugee nor an asylum seeker.
Although as it is France – you may have a point!
March 15, 2023
There are no refugees and asylum seekers crossing the Channel in small boats because not one of the criminals choosing that route is fleeing from France. If they started their journey as a genuine asylum seeker but decided to keep travelling after reaching a safe country then they are an illegal economic migrant to the UK, the same as if a citizen of that safe country decided that they wanted to sneak past the UK’s immigration controls.
March 15, 2023
Hey Guys , I think that NLH is a labour computer bott! No human could believe such nonsense
March 15, 2023
Genuine asylum seekers would be applying for asylum in France and be arriving with their passports to prove they had been fleeing from torture in their own countries.
March 15, 2023
Without giving offence to our host, your post lays bare the appalling state of our political class, the reason we are in this mess in the first place. The desire to appease and put the world population before those they are paid to represent. The endless laws to try to enforce that which they were never given public consent to do in the first place, has left us with only the banal and obvious questions raised, with soft language because even that now is heavily policed to appease.
March 15, 2023
@Michelle are you suggesting our Conservative Government along with seemingly the majority in Parliment are refusing to take on the duties that we have empowered them with and pay them for….
March 14, 2023
Indeed it has been reported for some years that Criminal gangs are now in control of many of the illegal people who come over and who have sold their future to such criminals/gangmasters for years in order to pay off their transportation debts.
It has also been reported that many are allegedly held in slave like conditions, working for a pittance, and are completely outside of our legal/employment system.
This ongoing criminal fiasco is simply poking two fingers up to our Government/Country.
March 15, 2023
This is what happens when you take a settled country, destroy its social fabric from within and open it to everyone and anyone. As it crumbles all they can do is slap ever more laws down to stifle the growing discontent. Either way the host population loses.
I remember years back seeing the adverts pulling at the heart strings about modern slavery here in Britain. Its inference being we should feel shame and guilt, but why? Most of this started because of virtual open borders and certain people from other lands being able to come here and bring their slaves with them.
It was only a question of time before criminal gangs saw how lucrative it would be for them to offer passage here, at a price. These book learned socialist types just cannot grasp what is human nature and what is criminal nature.
March 14, 2023
I wouldn’t be surprised if the GHQ for most of these European criminal gangs we hear about is right here in England.
March 14, 2023
Rose
I think it was a Sky report but a lot of the brains behind these operations actually do live over here and launder here all their illegal income accordingly.
The government should put a large bounty on their heads and upon conviction remove all their assets and properties. I am sure that some of the invaders might chance their arm for ÂŁ500k that would make them like a multi millionaire back in their natural.home.
March 15, 2023
Yes, because they are out of reach of the European Union’s integrated police database sharing arrangements.
You won.
Brexit means brexit.
Get over it.
March 15, 2023
That’s ridiculous. This has nothing to do with Brexit, for one it has been going on for years long before Brexit. With all the same outcomes, that being more of the same at a huge cost to us in every way imaginable.
The EU’s ‘values’ are all about co-operation with neighbours and the world in general. Surely those bastions of humanity that run the EU would desire to work with anyone in order to stop criminal gangs profiting from people trafficking and not just those that pay up to their little club.
I’d like you and many more to visit the South coast and speak to those that have worked in, what’s it called now, oh yes ‘Border Force’ (and no one sees the irony) for years and long before Brexit. All this and more was going on while we were in the EU. Only difference now is our political class cannot hide behind the EU and are standing naked before us.
March 15, 2023
It certainly doesnât seem as if you âgot over itâ!
March 15, 2023
@Nottingham Lad Himself So why are the EU still calling all the shots forour internal situations – probably because the Government is in denial hanging on to BRINO and constructing destruction to appease their unelected, unaccountable masters in the EU.
March 15, 2023
âWhy are the EU calling all the shots for our internal situationsâ: So according to you Sunak and Hunt took their orders from Brussels when the Home Office Minister introduced the Illegal Migration Bill, when Lee Henderson MP became Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party, when they put HS2 on the back burner, when the relevant Ministers refused to enter talks with the trade union representatives of nurses, doctors, train drivers, firemen, âŠ
Ridicule never killed anyone ⊠indeed.
March 15, 2023
Given the proximity of our country and the EU, the EU itâs be run by particularly stupid zealots if they refuse to share information about criminals with countries that border the EU. I mean – how stupid can you get.
March 15, 2023
It is not necessary to be in a political union or have free movement of people in order to share data. This and many other things have been withdrawn by the EU in a fit of pique. If we were still in the EU Albanians wouldn’t need dinghies to come here, they could transfer en masse legally.
March 15, 2023
I hope you know that Albania is not in the EU âŠ
March 15, 2023
@NLH; Never heard of Interpol?!…
March 15, 2023
Rose- Am afraid the criminal gangs who stirred this up are mostly politicians including Uk ones sitting there all around us – they are the ones who sent the army into iraq afghanistan attacked Libya etc and kicked it all off.
March 15, 2023
London is the premier place in the world to launder big money. Yet if you want to open a bank account with 50 quid you’ll be put through the wringer on laundering rules and if you want to take out a largish sum to say buy a car privately they’ll want to know what you are doing with it.
March 15, 2023
Oh yeah? One can open a bank account by inputting oneâs information on the web and making the required deposit.
âPut through the wringer on laundering rulesâ : what a laugh! You mean clicking âyesâ on the Terms & Conditions page.
Some building societies even only require an initial ÂŁ1 deposit. I have recently opened several accounts because of the extremely quick varying saving rate and none of them took me more than 15 minutes before I got the sort codes, the account numbers and the initial transfers done and dusted.
And obviously if you deal with large sums in cash, the authorities will want to know whether you may deal in drugs or maybe want to buy dinghies âŠ
What a moaner you are.
March 14, 2023
Thank you for raising this issue John. Suella confirms our fears so why aren’t more politicians concerned about this side of illegal immigration? Perhaps if they had to live in the real world like we do they may start to take notice.
March 15, 2023
++ exactly what I always think!
Maybe it has become more and more impossible to isolate oneself?
Rich people having ÂŁ72,000 watches snatched and daylight street hold-ups in Knightsbridge must concentrate the mind a little.
But none of it is right or FAIR. Newcomers have ben told lies and they think they are coming to Liberty Hall and that the streets are paved with gold!
March 14, 2023
Opponents of the Illegal Migration Bill appear to act as if they favour criminality.
March 14, 2023
Wow!
Sheâs implemented the Bill.
From today! Now!
March 15, 2023
Good morning.
Yes, and for every ‘refugee’ we send them, they will send one back to us, usually with either physical or mental health issues.
March 15, 2023
Yes Mark B. A pointless exercise, to our cost.
March 15, 2023
But your not supposed to notice that subterfuge BOF! Now sit up , knees together and behave yourself!
March 15, 2023
When will politicians even begin to understand the massive destabilisation effect of trying to accommodate all these invaders has on every aspect of our way of life?
How can we show to those already here and in desperate need of help and assistance to try and improve their lives when millions are spent daily on the invaders?
These people if allowed to stay will take their jobs and drive this country down into nothing more than a cheap labour third rate economy with even greater divides between the have and have not.
March 15, 2023
In Sweden, the generous and naive Swedes have a real alt right, racist, violent, angry as their welfare system is breaking down and the Police are more or less powerless in certain areas of Stockholm. Even the Mayor was deposed by the terrible immigrant gangs.
March 15, 2023
@turboterrier; People have been repeating that nonsense since at least the 1950s, with dire warnings added by one politico in the 1960s for effect, yet the UK is and has been a stable country, despite a few on the far right trying their upmost to exploit and destabilize, for their own ends. So cut the nonsense please, the issue is not immigration, nor asylum, but the dangers some are being put, hence the intent of this Bill. It does not and will not ban inward migration nor asylum claims!
March 15, 2023
Referring to comments by rose, turboterrier and Fedupsoutherner, having these criminals in control within the UK makes it even more imperative to turn the boats around in the channel. Nothing else will work, however many hundreds of billions of pounds is shovelled over to the French.
It is wasted tax payers money.
March 15, 2023
If I turned up in Australia to stay with my own daughter and her family and I did it without permission from the Australian government, I should be sent back on the next plane home.
March 15, 2023
Brits can visit Australia for three months with an Electronic Travel Authorisation readily available from the web, and for one year with a free multi-entry eVisa also available on-line.
Where are the equivalent visas for the UK?
March 16, 2023
Says the master of cut and paste – who knows absolutely everything about everything.
March 22, 2023
No, I might only know how to use the web whereas a number of people here seem to only know how to access Sir Johnâs site and never seem interested in checking the information round which they âdebateâ. Isnât it something you would encourage, say, youngsters to do?
March 15, 2023
how? Quite simply because they have border/immigration controls.
March 15, 2023
Ditto that for many countries around the world, yet we don’t hear the left wing elements screeching ‘racist’ at such countries. Many of them love to visit such countries, then come back waxing lyrical at how wonderful these countries are, how they embrace their centuries of culture etc.
I’m thinking of some of the places the young left wing in my family visit often and can’t praise them highly enough. Such countries do not give out citizenship like sweets, have high expectations of citizen behaviour, would never stand for their culture being trashed, and very rarely open their country to refugees. All the things the young left wing in my family consider backward, retarded, racist etc. etc. should their own country even hint at needing to take a leaf out of their book.
March 15, 2023
Ansell. Exactly. I’d love to live in Canada but because of my age I stand no chance even if I went through the legal route. I cannot just turn up and plead asylum or say I’m a victim of the slave trade. They’d just laugh and make me pay for my way home.
March 15, 2023
FUS. If you claimed to be a member of the opposite sex fleeing oppression, you might get some traction.
March 15, 2023
or to a camp on papua new guinea
March 15, 2023
@Anselm; Indeed, the UK does not have a visa-free agreement with Australia (nor many other countries). What are you suggesting, that everyone has to obtain a Visa to gain entry into the UK, fine, but the flip side will be the Visa UK citizens will need should we wish to visit the EU26, gone will be the booze cruise, the long weekend, the half term ski break….
March 15, 2023
I wonder what would happen if you turned up without a passport or any sort of ID and claimed asylum. Letâs face it, lots of us in this country would like to go to a sane country and claim asylum.
March 15, 2023
We KNOW the Establishment is importing violent foreign criminals, drug-gang members and probably terrorists.
What we DON’T know is why the Government refuses to take the steps necessary to stop it, which are to leave the ECHR return ALL the migrants to France.
The Bill which Sunak and Braverman are pushing through the Commons won’t do it. The new “business model” for the people traffickers has already been made perfectly clear: fill the boats with young males, under 18, and they’ll be granted asylum. In their own countries/cultures they are classed and treated as men (and many will be uneducated and violent). In the UK, we treat them as children …. and they will become the grappling hook kids so that their extended families can be shipped over when their asylum applications are accepted.
The Government simply doesn’t have the Will and brains to stop the boats ….. let alone the cojones.
March 15, 2023
+1
Apparently the ban is already being implemented. As of yesterday anyone coming in illegally is detained, arrested and then kicked out after so many days.
Braverman isnât waiting for the Bill to pass fullyâŠall this according to Mahyar Tousi.
No idea whether this is correctâŠbut he usually gets things right.
March 16, 2023
They may be doing it with some Albanians, following the deal made with the Albanian President.
March 15, 2023
Will these criminals be eligible for free childcare?
Robbing Peter to pay Paul – ridiculous
March 15, 2023
They do not need that Narrow Shoulders. They use their kids for county lines!
March 15, 2023
Of course, how dare you suggest otherwise. It would be entirely against ‘equality’ and their human rights.
There seems to be little to gain from trying to always do the right thing when you can gain heavily from just suiting yourself.
March 15, 2023
I would like to see a deeper investigation into this near medieval practice of trafficking people for profit.
I don’t believe that the foreign criminal gangs are so smart as to know all our laws inside out, not without a lot of help from this side of the English Chanel.
I want a thorough investigation as to which groups and/or individuals here are helping grease the wheels of this smooth uninterrupted running of a cruel inhuman business. They should be exposed, especially as I suspect they are very keen to shout from the roof tops about human rights etc. Me thinks they protest too much.
The Cameron Govt. brought in the sort of ‘paper trail’ laws to find those here illegally or caught in modern day slavery. How has that worked out? I know it has made even the simplest and banal things we used to enjoy with ease now become one of red tape at ludicrous levels. I couldn’t even make an appointment at the dentist for my Daughter yesterday as I hadn’t filled out all the consent forms!! What the hell is that all about?
Now photo ID’s for elections another sign of moving from a high trust society to low trust.
March 15, 2023
Well if you can drag our woke police force away from their Bramshill induced desire to become internet warriors and get them breaking the drug and prostitution gangs it would be a step in the right direction. Deportation as convicted crimminals to the penal systems of countries whence they came would be a money saver for all in the UK.
March 15, 2023
Why is the government proposing to send illegal immigration to Rwanda when most of them who are economic migrants are from a two day bus ride away?
Why does the government expect to enforce the Bill when it conflicts with the UN Migration Pact and the ECHR and these are still recognised?
March 15, 2023
What provision is there within this Bill [1] to make it a duty on the Home Office, the DHSC or a Local Authority to assassin the true health and development status of unaccompanied children, given these children will likely be living with, or mixing with, other children (attending school etc). Will there be a statutory duty to give each child a full, thorougher, medical and psychological examination, to include MRI and dental scans or similar?
[1] or does this duty already exist in earlier legislation
March 15, 2023
There will be no change at street level. I like the way Suella Braverman talks but she is up against the leftwing politically dominated establishment and no-one anywhere in authority will support her tackle that. The reason being they live in their debating chamber world, which they like and know, not the real world. They think it is enough as a problem solver and they are safe in it.
The original people of this country, and I refer to England, whose cultural beliefs are being destroyed must decide action is their only source to protect themselves. Their leaders are crushing us to the benefit of others and we are being told other laws, and other people are better than us. England is denied identity by the same leaders who tell us we must respect others.
March 15, 2023
It isnât just the criminal gangs who are exploiting the illegal immigrants. It is also the whole of the human rights industry in the UK â the Home Office civil servants, âcharity groupsâ, the NGOs, the human rights lobby groups, the human rights lawyers and the judges all making money out of the taxpayer encouraging illegal immigration by declaring we should have open borders whilst making the laws instead of our elected representatives in Parliament.
Not forgetting the whole industry built upon looking after the illegal immigrants giving them free shelter, free meals, free health and social care and ÂŁ40/week pocket money. It all requires organisation and staff and the use of resources and no doubt counts as increasing our GDP. The more illegal immigrants that land on our shores the more money they all make.
So for our current Parliament, what’s not to like?
March 15, 2023
If you reduce crime and keep criminals at bay, you risk putting the lefty lawyers out of a job.
March 15, 2023
Why support the ridiculous Rwanda scheme? The President of Tunisia has shown the way: round them up and kick them out.
March 15, 2023
JR, please could you ask the Home Secretary to take a look at this article in the Irish News today:
https://www.irishnews.com/news/northernirelandnews/2023/03/14/news/fears_that_new_immigration_measures_could_see_us_tourists_detained_at_border-3134557/
“Fears that new immigration measures could see US tourists detained at border”
and arrange for a reply both to the newspaper and Claire Hanna MP pointing out that:
1. Nobody will be stopped at the border asked to produce their ETA; and
2. Anybody who is found to have entered illegally from Ireland will be returned to Ireland, not sent to Rwanda.
3. That the UK is merely doing what the EU is doing, it is no more sinister than that:
https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/etias/
4. That American tourists will have to do that if they want to include the continent in their transatlantic visit;
5. And one might expect travel companies in the US to tell their customers about that and other formalities.
It is another load of anti-British and anti-Brexit rubbish that needs to be countered by the UK government.
I know that you are not my MP but you know who is my MP and that it would be quite pointless asking her.
Reply Not my job to respond to misleading Irish newspaper articles.
March 16, 2023
I do not see what the fuss is all about. In general, a visa to visit the Republic of Ireland is not valid to visit the UK, therefore Northern Ireland. A visa to visit the UK is not valid to visit the Republic of Ireland. It has been like this for decades.
The confusion likely arises because US citizens do not need a visa to visit the RoI but need a Standard Visitor visa to visit the UK. And in absence of border control between RoI and NI it is very easy for a US tourist to go to, say, the Giantâs Causeway and be in infraction.
What a storm in a tea cup. Nothing better to do, Denis?
March 15, 2023
People who come here in small boats are first of all human beings each one being an individual in his or her own right and are protected by international treatiex and law enacted and entered into freely by our governments and Parliament at different times in the past so they deserve our respect support and protection until at least such time that they break british law or behave criminally or until such time that international law stipulates differently. Coming to Britain as a refugee or asylum seeker in a small boat is not a crime – deporting migrants recently arrived on our shores to a third country like Rawanda or anywhere else without their permission or agreement is most certainly a crime.
March 15, 2023
@Jameson; “until at least such time that they break british law or behave criminally”
Except by turning up *illegally* they have broken UK law, the cue is in the word illegal immigrant, duh. What is more, many have knowingly conspired with others to break international laws on people smuggling, after all they were hardly hailing a cross-channel water-taxi!
“Coming to Britain as a refugee or asylum seeker”
Except many are neither, most appear to be economic migrants. This Bill has not and is not proposing any change in the UK’s commitments to true refugee or asylum seekers.
March 15, 2023
Sorry Jameson, the way you put it, that has to be nonsense. A foreigner ‘arriving in a small boat’ and seeking to land with no papers is entitled to nothing. Only if s/he claims asylum do international agreements come into play, and then the claim should be properly assessed. With the Channel dinghy people, that shouldn’t take long: they are coming from a safe country, they’re not refugees. I’m not aware of any international agreement we signed that guarantees entry to economic migrants. If you are, please share the title of that agreement and when it was signed.
March 15, 2023
I am under the impression that those crossing the Channel and landing illegally on our shores are put up in â4 star hotelsâ and given everything they need. A roof over their head, food, warmth, pocket money, unlimited access to the NHS. Do they get new clothes too?
Are they under some sort of house arrest or can they just leave and disappear into the unregulated economy?
Why donât we look after those that have served this country in the armed forces as well as those who arrive here illegally?