The ex-head of the British Border Force has said stopping migrant smuggling gangs is “like Whac-A-Mole” because another one will always pop up.
Tony Smith, director-general of the UK Border Force until 2013, said there needs to be a “very concerted international attempt, both in Europe and beyond”.
He said: “This is a very lucrative business for the smugglers – putting a smuggling gang out of business, there’s usually another one waiting in the wings because the money is there – it’s a bit like Whac-A-Mole, really. So you do need a very concerted international attempt, both in Europe and beyond.”
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Home Secretary Yvette Cooper chaired a summit on Friday (September 6) aimed at destroying the criminal gangs involved in smuggling people over the English Channel.
She said there is a “moral imperative” to stop the gangs helping people get to Britain in small boats.
(Image: Getty Images)
Dame Angela Eagle, the border security minister, said if you have to put one smuggling gang “out of business and another springs up”, then “you have to spend your time having a go at that one as well”.
She said: “I think that any state has got to ensure that criminal gangs who are profiting off human misery are tackled, disrupted, dealt with, put out of business.
“Just because something is very, very difficult to do, complex to do – something that you have to do by co-operation across borders, by a lot of communication along these supply chains of misery and exploitation – that isn’t to say that you shouldn’t be doing it, and that is what today’s summit is about, really.”
Conservative shadow home secretary James Cleverly said it was “not enough to talk about ‘smashing the gangs’ when the real-life consequences are so serious”.