Yet another boatload of illegal migrants has landed on the English coast, as the MP for Dover urges the authorities to “get a grip” of the situation.
Nine migrants were the discovered on Sandgate beach in Kent by a Coastguard rescue helicopter, after a lifeboat launched from Littlestone station had conducted a shoreline search.
This follows around 40 migrants reaching Britain after being intercepted while making a Christmas Day dash across the English Channel and brought ashore, followed by three more on Boxing Day.
Another five migrants made it all the way to Dover without being caught, reportedly starting up a fire on the beach to warm themselves before marching into town and presenting themselves at a police station in Ladywell to claim asylum.
Dozens more made similar journeys earlier in 2018, with the number of Channel crossings — once rare — seriously escalating starting in November.
“The Home Office and the National Crime Agency do not appear to be on top of this situation,” complained Charlie Elphicke, Tory MP for Dover.
“With well over 100 migrants having broken into Britain in recent weeks they need urgently to explain what they are doing to put a stop to these crossings.
“This is an incredibly dangerous crossing to make in the middle of winter.
“Our volunteer lifeboat crews are being called out nearly every day – even during Christmas,” he warned.
“The British and French authorities must get a grip and find and stop the traffickers behind these crossings before there is a tragedy in the English Channel.”
Why illegal migrants are being brought ashore and apparently having asylum claims processed when making reckless sea crossings from safe and wealthy countries like France and Belgium, endangering British lifeboat crews as well as themselves and any dependents they bring with them, is not always clear to the British public.
However, Henry Bolton, a former head of the Borders Unit at the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), who would later go on to become UKIP leader for a brief period, explained to Breitbart London in 2017 that, within the EU, the British government cannot simply deport migrants arriving from another EU member-state back across the border.
Instead, EU regulations mandate that migrants must be sent back to the first EU country they entered — and if this cannot be determined, the receiving country is generally stuck with them.
Christopher Chope, another Tory MP, introduced an Illegal Immigrants (Criminal Sanctions) Bill to Parliament in 2016, which would have deterred migrants by imposing prison terms of up to six months or a £2,000 fine for illegal entry to Britain or overstaying a visa — followed by deportation.
However, the Government under then-Prime Minister David Cameron said the bill was not necessary, and that deportation was “no answer” to illegal immigration via safe countries — and it does not seem to have changed this stance under current leader Theresa May.
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