Starmer accused of ‘abject failure' as people smuggling arrests fall under Labour

Independent

a day ago

People smuggling arrests by the UK's organised crime agency have fallen under Labour, despite Sir Keir Starmer 's pledge to "smash the gangs", as the number of small boat migrants arriving since he took charge soars past 50,000.
The latest National Crime Agency (NCA) data shows 192 people were arrested for organised immigration crime in the year to April – down 16 per cent from 229 under the Tory government the previous year.
Labour has faced growing criticism over its failure to cut the number of people making the perilous crossing, with education minister Baroness Jacqui Smith admitting the figures were 'unacceptable'.
Former Tory immigration minister Robert Jenrick said the latest arrest figures proved 'it's never been easier to be a people smuggler', while former home secretary Chris Philp said they proved Starmer's big talk about smashing the gangs has been an 'abject failure'.
It comes as the government ramps up its efforts to tackle the issue amid growing public anger, which has sparked a series of violent protests outside migrant hotels across the country.
The prime minister has adopted a hardline approach on immigration, with a string of new measures announced, as he tries to win back voters and fend off the surge in popularity from Nigel Farage's Reform UK.
Earlier this year, Yvette Cooper announced an extra £100m to tackle people-smuggling gangs, including 300 more staff at the NCA ' focused on intelligence targeting crime gang members'.
And last week, Sir Keir confirmed that the first migrants had been detained under the new 'one in, one out' swap deal between the UK and France – although none have yet been sent back to Europe.
The Home Office has also expanded its 'deport now, appeal later' scheme, which sees foreign criminals deported before their appeals have been heard.
Despite the fall in people smuggling arrests last year, the NCA said it has "dedicated more resources than ever before' to tackling the threat from organised immigration crime.
NCA acting deputy director Dan Barcroft said: 'Arrests on their own are not the only way to judge impact. We have also achieved record numbers of disruptions against people smugglers – 347 last year, up almost a third - each of which will have removed, prevented or reduced a criminal threat.'
'Arrest figures may fluctuate, but over the last four years the NCA has been involved in more than 900 arrests relating to organised immigration crime in the UK and overseas.'
The Home Office told The Independent that further people smuggling arrests have been made by Immigration Enforcement and police forces, but refused to share any details.
A spokesman said: 'We are taking firm and targeted action to dismantle the organised criminal networks responsible for dangerous small boat crossings – networks that put vulnerable lives at risk and undermine border security.'
Reacting to the figures, Mr Jenrick said: 'Starmer said he'd smash the gangs but arrests of people smugglers are down and record numbers of migrants have crossed this year. For all of Starmer's talk, it's never been easier to be a people smuggler.'
A Labour MP on the right of the party told The Independent they were 'frustrated' by the government's pace of action.
They said: 'The public think we're basically not doing anything and don't believe smashing the gangs will make any material difference. And so far, their suspicions are being borne out by the facts. We have to move heaven and earth to get and show we have control.'
Over the past decade, the NCA has been involved in over 2,200 arrests linked to immigration crime in the UK and overseas, with a 93 per cent conviction rate.
While the figures do not exclusively cover small boat migration, a large proportion of such crimes involve bringing people across the Channel. This includes arrests across the people smuggling operations chain, from those who supply small boats to lorry drivers illegally ferrying migrants.
The NCA told The Independent it is currently leading 91 investigations into organised immigration crime.
Despite lower arrest numbers, the NCA said its increased disruptions 'reflect a move towards taking the fight to gangs upstream, focusing on the highest harm networks, and hitting them where the impact on their business will be greater'.
One such example last month saw the NCA and Bulgarian law enforcement seize 25 inflatable boats set for use by people smugglers crossing the Channel.
Sunder Kutwala, director at the British Future thinktank, said the government's best shot at tackling the problem is to scale up the one-in-one-out deal with France to 500 or 1,000 people a week.
'If [people smuggling] is a lucrative business, and the barriers to entry are pretty low and the cost of getting your dinghy slashed is quite low – or getting low-level operatives arrested is low – you'll always get new entries to the market' he told The Independent.
'The government has now got a shot at establishing the returns deal and, with enforcement, it looks more viable than any of these offshoring models [like Rwanda]. If I was the government, I would [scale up] quickly not slowly.'
The number of migrants crossing into the UK by small boats is up 47 per cent from the same time last year, at record levels.
Fourteen people have already died this year trying to cross into the UK, with the highest on record (73) last year, and a woman, 30, died on Monday while trying to board a boat attempting to make the crossing to the UK from Dunkirk.
The Mayor of Dunkirk, Patrice Vergriete, said that the situation "can't stand much longer". He called for the creation of a "legal immigration route to the UK" saying "our coastline is a daily witness to an absurd, ineffective and terribly cruel management of the migration crisis".