Sir Keir Starmer, leader of the Labor Party, plans to use greater cooperation with the EU to manage migration. Photo: Carl Court/Getty Images < p>Sir Keir Starmer will pledge on Friday to use terrorism laws to tackle the small craft crisis as part of plans to work more closely with Europe to tackle people smugglers.
The Labor leader will announce about plans for their disposal. Rwanda scheme and use the money to create a border security team with new powers to treat smugglers as terrorists.
He will use a speech in the Dover constituency of Natalie Elphicke, the Conservative MP who defected to Labor on Wednesday, to argue for greater European cooperation on immigration and try to counter Conservative claims that Labor has no plans to stop boats.
His proposals were supported by Neil Basu, a former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police and head of the UK's counter-terrorism police from 2018 to 2021, who advised Labor on the plan.
Writing in The Telegraph, a former Met assistant commissioner said the proposals could make a «huge difference» as he called the government's scheme in Rwanda an «extraordinarily expensive» gamble with taxpayers' money without any evidence it would work.
Neil Basu, former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police and former head of Britain's counter-terrorism police, backed the Labor Party's border proposals Photo: Dominic Lipinski/Pennsylvania
Sir Keir will say: “We must work with our European partners to seize these boats and seize the material here in the UK to gather further evidence. We must turn over every stone and use every reasonable force. This is my message to the smugglers: these shores will become hostile territory for you.”
The announcement on immigration will be seen as an attempt to seize the initiative in a sensitive political area for the party, Rishi Sunak has said. , the prime minister, is aiming to organize the first migrant flights to Rwanda in July. Last week the Labor Party said it would consider the asylum claims of more than 90,000 migrants who entered the UK illegally if the Labor Party wins the election.
Labor has said a new border security command, led by a former police, army or intelligence chief, will work with international agencies to break up trafficking rings and put British police at the center of Europe-wide efforts to combat people smuggling. The announcement comes after speculation that Labor wants to restore closer ties with the EU.
The center will be modeled on the Office of Security and Counterterrorism, created by the last Labor government to overhaul its approach to national security. .
It will be supported by up to 1,000 additional officers hired by MI5, the National Crime Agency (NCA), Border Force and the police, who will be paid the £75 million a year that would have been spent on sending migrants to Rwanda. Recruitment, including the commander, will begin within weeks of the Labor Party's election victory.
An inflatable boat carrying migrants passes a French navy ship bound for England. Sir Keir Starmer has suggested that greater cooperation with European countries is the best way to reduce illegal migration. According to the Home Office, 8,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel this year. Photo: Chris J. Ratcliffe/Reuters
Under the Terrorism Act 2000, officers will be given enhanced powers to stop and search organized immigration crime, allowing them to carry out body searches, check and confiscate mobile phones and copy any data on devices.
How to Police Counter-terrorism officers can obtain warrants to search the premises of suspected people smugglers and seize items before a crime is committed, and apply to the court for early access to financial information about suspects.
They can also use serious crime prevention orders crimes. restrict the internet, banking and travel of suspected smugglers before they are convicted.
Starmer calls for a move away from «performative symbols».
Sir Keir admits restoring the asylum system will be a «test of leadership to counter the voices that fundamentally do not want to restore a functioning asylum system.»
< p>Sources have suggested that he was referring to both the left, which wants to restore open borders, and the right, which wants to prevent illegal migrants from seeking asylum.
«The question is whether you can always prioritize the politics of practical solutions and reject the politics of performative symbols — tricks and gestures,» he will say.
About 8,826 migrants, according to the Home Office, arrived in the UK after crossing La -Mansha this year. This is 32 percent more than last year, when 6,691 migrants were registered, and 14 percent more than the same period in 2022.
Sir Keir will say: “After many years of experience in this area, I firmly believe we need new and stronger powers to enforce the law and bring these smugglers to justice. Powers that in some areas, especially in the fight against terrorism, we have expanded, recognizing the dangers posed to our security.
“It’s not hard to see why the Prime Minister might want a path to containment without the tough, perhaps boring approach of fixing the wider system. But I'm afraid that, like so much of what he says these days, it's Band-Aids. Tricks, not serious government.”
Referring to the government's plan to deport migrants entering Rwanda illegally, he said: “Let me explain this again. A scheme that would eliminate only 1 percent of small vessel border crossings per year cannot and will never be an effective deterrent. It is an insult to anyone's intelligence and the gangs who run this disgusting business are not easily fooled.»
A Tory source said: «Labour have voted against the Government more than a hundred times to give us more powers to tackle this global crisis. problems and they have no replacement, no deterrent, no safe third destination, and true to form they will stop the partnership with Rwanda even if it works.”
The source added: «Starmer's new plan is his old plan, which is not a plan.»
Basu criticized Braverman's immigration stance
This is not the first time the Labor Party has hired a police chief to help shape its policy. Lord Stevens, a former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, chaired a commission set up by Labor in 2011 to develop proposals for policing in the area.
Steve Otter, former Chief Constable of Devon and Cornwall, was a member of the Labor Commission panel led by Dame Vera Baird, the former Victims Commissioner, which was tasked with developing reforms to increase detection rates. He announced his recommendations earlier this year.
The Labor Party asked Mr Bas to advise on immigration plans because of his experience in fighting terrorism. He quit the Met in 2022 after being overlooked as head of the National Crime Agency.
As one of the most senior police officers of Asian descent, he has spoken out on race issues and criticized Suelle Braverman for her comments on immigration as Home Secretary.
“It is incredible to hear a succession of very powerful politicians who look like this , speaking a language that my father remembered from 1968. It's terrible,» he said.
Ms Elphicke is expected to join Sir Keir for the Dover appearance. She accused Mr Sunak of breaking his promise to stop the boats when she fled on Wednesday.
Her defection was greeted with surprise by the Conservatives, with Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron saying it showed Labor was standing on his. no way, and Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, said she was a «very strange fit» for the opposition.
The Rwanda scheme is a gamble: we must fight boats like terrorism. Read more
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