I understand your frustrations but there is no magic wand to solve migrant crisis

LAST week we were given the starkest possible reminder of how dangerous it is to try and cross the Channel in a small, unseaworthy boat.

The criminal gangs forcing people into flimsy dinghies don’t care for the lives of those in the boats, they only care for the cash lining their pockets.

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They are gambling with human lives — as we saw so tragically when 27 people lost their lives in the water on Wednesday.

That horrific event only served to underline the need for effective and co-ordinated action on both sides of the Channel, and with our European partners.

The reaction of Sun on Sunday readers — and the wider British public — to this devastating loss of life was rightly to ask what the Government will do to prevent further tragedies.

Our joint work with the French has prevented more than 20,000 crossings so far this year, and intelligence sharing has led to over 400 arrests relating to small boat criminality since 2020.

At the heart of these challenges is a global migration crisis and an asylum system that I declared broken not long after I became Home Secretary — and I have spent the last two years working to fix it.

Following conflicts in places like Syria and Afghanistan, the world is faced with mass migration on a scale we have not witnessed before.

And our asylum system, untouched and unreformed during what have been 20 turbulent years for the world, was not designed to cope with the situation we currently face.

This Government’s New Plan for Immigration is overhauling that broken system for the first time in two decades.

The plan will break the business model of international criminal gangs by making the UK a less attractive destination for illegal migrants.

It will differentiate between those who arrive here through safe and legal routes and those who seek to circumvent this system by entering the UK illegally.

It will speed up the asylum claims system so that we can separate the genuine asylum seekers from economic migrants quickly.

It will end the merry-go-round of legal challenges that stop us removing those with no right to be in the country.

If migrants don’t think they’ll be allowed to stay in the UK, they won’t risk their lives and pay criminals thousands of pounds to get here.

Be in no doubt, this Government understands the public’s deep concerns about illegal immigration

Priti Patel

Parliament is still considering the Nationality and Borders Bill — the new law that will put much of that plan into action.

We simply cannot afford to delay passing that Bill into law. We need opposition parties to urgently get behind this. Lives depend on it.

Be in no doubt, this Government understands the public’s deep concerns about illegal immigration: The security of our country and the integrity of our border remains my number one priority.

But I have also been consistent in warning that there is no silver bullet that will provide all the answers overnight.

It is only long-term reform through our New Plan for Immigration.

I understand people’s frustrations, but over a year ago I said in terms that “if the solution to stop this was simple and straightforward, then believe me, this issue would have been resolved by now”.

I have also been warning for some time that the only way to stop deaths occurring in the Channel is to stop the trade in people that causes them.

Wednesday’s incident was certainly shocking, but it was, sadly, not entirely surprising. It was the event that many of us have feared for some time.

And there should now be an even greater onus on all of us on both sides of the Channel to act.

We have a long history of working constructively with our friends across the Channel on shared challenges: Just look at how our engagement and co-operation with the French authorities on security at the border in Calais in recent years has almost eliminated cases of illegal migrants hiding in lorries to come to the UK.

Ironically, it was our success at tackling those using the lorry route that led the monstrous gangs to switch their attention to boats.

The world is faced with mass migration on a scale we have not witnessed before

Priti Patel

The deaths of those 27 people should serve as a clear call to co-operate, collaborate and work even better together than we are already.

There is still so much more we can do and I am sorry not to be at a meeting with European ministerial counterparts today to discuss this pressing issue.

We need to be creative about finding new solutions that will have the maximum possible impact, which is why the Prime Minister and I stand ready to discuss proposals with our French counterparts at any time.

And I know from my discussions with my European partners in recent days and weeks that there is more that can be done.

Together, we can break up the people-smuggling gangs and save lives — but we must act now.

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