What is ‘one in, one out' migrant deal between UK and France?

First Post

11-07-2025

The UK and France have reached an agreement to try to stem the flow of migrants making the crossing from France to the UK via the English Channel. The development comes against the backdrop of a visit from French President Emmanuel Macron to the United Kingdom for a summit with Keir Starmer. But what do we know about the 'one in, one out' deal? Will it stop the boats? read more
A British police officer stands guard on the beach of Dungeness, on the southeast coast of England, on 15 June, 2022, as Royal National Lifeboat Institution's (RNLI) members of staff help migrants to disembark. (Photo: AFP file)
The UK and France have reached an agreement to stop the flow of migrants.
The development comes in the backdrop of a visit from French President Emmanuel Macron to the United Kingdom for a summit.
This is the first visit of a European leader to the UK since Brexit.
Macron and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer discussed the 'one in, one out' migrant deal during a bilateral meet.
But what do we know about the deal? What do experts say?
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Let's take a closer look:
What do we know about the deal?
The deal aims at stopping illegal immigrants from making the crossing from France to the UK via the English Channel.
Under the agreement, asylum seekers who cannot prove they have families in the UK will be returned to France.
The UK, for each migrant returned, will give one migrant from France who can prove a family connection in the UK asylum – hence the name of the programme.
'In exchange for every return, a different individual will be allowed to come here via a safe route - controlled and legal - subject to strict security checks, and only open to those who have not tried to enter the UK illegally,' Starmer said.
The deal is still to get the final assent from European lawyers.
Under the agreement, those who cross the Channel will be detained. Those who come under the programme will be sent back to France.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Starmer said the agreement would come into effect within 'weeks'. File image/AP
However, this will be subject to appeal. After one person is sent back to France, another person applying for asylum legitimately and who has not attempted the illegal crossing will be admitted to the UK.
The programme will be paid for by the Home Office. The programme will be reviewed on an ongoing basis.
Though neither Starmer nor Macron mentioned numbers, some reports stated that around 50 migrants would be sent back per week initially.
However, this would work out to just around 2,600 people per year – a fraction of the numbers that cross.
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A deadly journey
Migrants and their families usually make the crossing from France, sans visas and permits, in small inflatable boats.
Over 21,000 people have done so in 2025.
This is a 56 per cent increase over the same period in 2024.
Last year, around 20,000 people made the crossing.
The migrants pay criminal gangs large sums of money to transport them across the channel to the UK.
In March 2025, most migrants arriving by boats were Afghans, Syrians, Iranians, the Vietnamese and Eritreans.
These groups alone comprised 61 per cent of all arrivals.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has estimated that 82 migrants died last year while crossing the channel.
This would make it the most deadliest year on record for such crossings.
The UN agency said at least 18 people had died while crossing the English Channel in 2025.
Since 2018 around 247 people are estimated to have been killing while attempting to cross to the UK.
'Break back of criminal gangs'
He added that the deal is aimed at breaking the back of criminal gangs.
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'We all agree that the situation in the Channel cannot go on as it is so we're bringing new tactics into play and a new intent to tackle illegal migration and break the business model of the criminal gangs', he said.
We 'apply our collective strength and leadership' to the challenges of undocumented migration, the UK prime minister added.
Starmer said the agreement would come into effect within 'weeks'.
'Migrants arriving via small boat will be detained and returned to France in short order,' Starmer added.
He called the agreement a 'pilot programme'.
He said that though 'no silver bullet' existed, UK and France could 'finally turn the tables' with 'a united effort, new tactics and a new level of intent'.
French President Emmanuel Macron has blamed Brexit for the increased numbers of people crossing the English Channel. File image/AP
'The jobs they have been promised in the UK will no longer exist because of the nationwide crackdown we're delivering on illegal working which is on a completely unprecedented scale', Starmer said.
Macron called the deal a 'good agreement'.
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He took aim at Brexit for the increased number of crossings.
'Many people in your country explained that Brexit would make it possible to fight more effectively against illegal immigration," Macron said.
'But it's in fact since Brexit [that] the UK has no migratory agreement with the EU. It creates an incentive to make the crossing, the precise opposite of what Brexit had promised.'
He said that British people were 'sold a lie…which is that the problem was Europe, but the problem has become Brexit'.
Britain and France have long been at odds over illegal immigration.
France has claimed that the UK's laws are too lax or not properly enforced.
Macron has claimed that around third of all migrants arriving in France plan to head to the UK.
'Britain must do something to make itself less attractive and change the rules of their labour market because you can work without papers in the UK,' France's justice minister previously said.
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The UK, on the other hand, has taken aim at France for not doing enough to stop the boats and cracking down on criminal gangs – which Paris hotly disputes.
Hot-button issue
Asylum and immigration has become a hot-button issue in the UK.
Over 51 per cent of people say it is their main concern, according to a recent poll.
The deal was reached because of the increasing number of unauthorised migrants arriving from France to the UK, Peter Walsh, a senior researcher at the Migration Observatory at Oxford University, told Al Jazeera.
Starmer's Labour government had come to power vowing to get illegal immigration under control.
The UK under Rishi Sunak had previously signed a $650 million deal with France to help increase its efforts at cracking down on such illegal immigration.
Former British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak at Westminster Abbey in London, Britain. Reuters/File Photo
Experts remain unsure if the deal will actually work.
'A returns deal may have an impact if it affects enough people. We don't know how many people could plausibly be returned to France under this deal, but there's a risk that if an insufficiently low share of individuals are returned, then people wishing to reach the UK by small boat may see the risk of return as another risk worth taking – alongside the much greater risk of getting in a small boat,' Walsh told Al Jazeera.
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The UK previously tried deporting illegal immigrants to Rwanda – a controversial scheme which was blocked by the courts and which it ultimately dropped.
Some slam deal
Opposition figures in the UK have slammed the deal.
Reform leader Nigel Farage has said he did not 'this so-called deal will make any difference at all.'
'If we even try to deport people across the Channel we will run straight into the European Convention on Human Rights as written into British law, in the human rights act. The lawyers will have a field day and will find lots of reasons why people can't be deported.
'Nobody who crosses the English Channel illegally, in a boat, should ever be given refugee status, should ever be given leave to remain, and should be deported and if we did that, it would stop within a fortnight.'
Farage isn't the only one.
Nigel Farage, the leader of the hard-right Reform UK party, has slammed the deal. Reuters
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp of the opposition Conservative Party told The Times newspaper, 'This deal will mean that 94 percent of illegal migrants crossing the Channel will get to stay. That is pathetic and will not deter anyone. By contrast, the Rwanda deterrent would have seen 100 percent of illegal migrants removed and that would have worked to deter people crossing the Channel. Keir Starmer's failure continues.'
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Some French officials have also come out against the agreement.
'We are putting ourselves into the hands of the British without minimal reciprocal elements,' an unnamed French official involved in the know told Le Monde.
Interestingly, the EU and Turkey reached a similar deal in 2016 to return migrants crossing the border for Syrian refugees inside Turkey.
The Migration Policy Institute said the number of asylum seekers arriving in Greece, which was 861,000 in 2015, shrank to 36,000 the year the deal was signed.
However, in 2019 that number increased again to 75,000.
It remains to be seen whether this deal between the UK and France actually stops the boats.
With inputs from agencies