Experts have pleaded for a drastic new approach to stopping small boats after the deaths of 12 people – including six children and a pregnant woman – in the latest Channel tragedy.
Ministers are warned that enforcement alone isn’t working, with people making increasingly dangerous journeys due to increased security measures. At least 30 people are known to have died crossing the Channel this year.
The latest incident, which happened on Tuesday morning, has sparked fresh calls for safe and legal routes to be expanded. Dozens of people were rescued from a packed small boat which sank off the coast in Cape Gris-Nez yesterday. But French authorities confirmed that ten women and girls and two men lost their lives.
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Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: “The number of deaths in the Channel this year has been shockingly high. It is a devastating trend that shows the urgent need for a comprehensive and multi-pronged approach to reduce dangerous Channel crossings. Enforcement alone is not the solution.
“Heightened security and policing measures on the French coast have led to increasingly perilous crossings, launching from more dangerous locations and in flimsy, overcrowded vessels. In addition to taking action against the criminal gangs themselves, the Government must develop a plan to improve and expand safe routes for those seeking safety.”
He continued: “We must create effective and humane pathways for those seeking refuge to reduce the need for dangerous crossings and prevent further tragedies.”
Nadine Tunasi, from Freedom from Torture, said she was “devastated” by the latest tragedy. She said: ” The people in that boat, like most of those who continue to come to the UK seeking sanctuary are men, women and children who’ve fled torture and war, and they deserve to live. I know from the survivors I work with that no one gets into an overcrowded and unseaworthy dingy to cross one of the world ’s busiest shipping lanes without a desperate need to find safety.
“Too much time has been wasted on gimmicks and hateful politics, while conflict continues to push people to take dangerous routes to sanctuary. This Government is right to focus on conflict resolution and humanitarian aid to stem the flow of desperate refugees. But this will take time, and in the absence of safe routes people like me will be forced to continue to risk their lives.”
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Steve Smith, chief executive of Care4Calais said: “Every political leader, on both sides of our Channel, needs to be asked how many lives will be lost before they end these avoidable tragedies? Their continued obsession, and investment, in security measures is not reducing crossings, it is simply pushing people to take ever increasing risks to do so.
“Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome is political lunacy. It’s time politicians were held accountable for their choice to dehumanise people seeking sanctuary from horrors back home. It’s time they ended these tragedies and introduced safe routes.”
Most people on board the vessel involved in yesterday’s tragedy were from Eritrea, French authorities said.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper branded the incident “horrifying and deeply tragic” as she said “vital” efforts to dismantle “dangerous and criminal smuggler gangs” and to boost border security “must proceed apace”.
Last week Mr Starmer dodged a question from The Mirror about whether he would extend safe and legal routes in order to stop small boat crossings.
The PM responded: “So far as stopping the boats is concerned, we have got to take down the gangs that are running the boat trade in the first place, which is why we’re setting up the border security command.”
He said he was “absolutely clear” that treating smuggling gangs like terrorism gangs is the key to bringing down the “vile trade”.