Choppy Waters for the Government over Small Boats

The numbers keep rising as smugglers stay one step ahead of the authorities.

The Dover MP has a plan. As does the government. As does the Home Secretary. So, too, do local councils. And refugee groups. And of course, Nigel Farage is making sure his voice is heard.

We are, of course, talking about the ongoing conundrum of how best to deal with the thousands of migrants continuing to drift over the Channel to the UK.

Dover Port, Kent

When you hear a politician say that they face ‘serious challenges’ on a particular issue, you know that whatever they proposed before to deal with it has in all likelihood, failed.

But how do you acknowledge failure at the same time as defending the measures that did not work and are being replaced?

If there has been one issue that has vexed all political parties, it is finding a solution to the ongoing crisis of would-be migrants turning up in their thousands in often unsafe dinghies to reach the UK.

Night after night, day after day, hundreds of “irregular” migrants are able to claim asylum the moment they step foot on UK soil.

The more punitive the measures - and the are - , the more the numbers go up. The more they promise to crack down on the criminal gangs, the greater the number of clandestine crossings.

Having a plan is one thing, but it is next to useless if it can’t deliver what is needed on the ground.

Unfortunately, politicians do not measure the success or failure of their policies by declaring that elements of their latest crackdown have worked while others have been less than successful.

It’s an all-or-nothing strategy; one which raises the stakes significantly.

Our elected representatives live in fear of being found out, which is why it is so difficult to contrive a package of measures that would satisfy everyone.

And governing by crude slogans achieves next to nothing beyond - well appealing toto your core support. The Conservatives penned the underwhelming “Stop the Boats” which had the merit of simplicity but little else.

And everyone had - and has - a plan. You couldn’t move for plans which led to a blizzard of policy proposals and arguments.

The plans the Conservative party had drawn up left the former Dover MP Natalie Elphicke so unimpressed, she jumped ship and defected to Labour in the run-up to the general election in 2024.

She said the Conservatives had failed to deliver on its promises and that the Rwanda plan was flawed. It had taken the former MP until just a few weeks from the election to reach this position, a curious piece of timing.

Labour leader Sir Kier Starmer spent the election campaign telling everyone he had a plan to “smash the criminal gangs.”

He didn’t specify how serious the threat was and how he intended to ‘smash’ those behind the smuggling.

Vacuity is the name of the game; if you can heap blame on someone else, it’s all for the good.

Meanwhile, Dover MP Mike Tapp has vented his anger in a video posted on X in which he said the criminal gangs were ‘mocking’ us.

There was a plan - of course - to deal with these gangs - but it was the mood music that counted and the theatrical flourish with which he identified gang leaders who had already been captured and put on trial signalled his intent.

The trouble is that outrage won’t get you very far and neither will a plan which fails to say what will be done.

Immigration remains a touchstone issue for all parties but there is a common theme - that the only way it will be resolved is if the UK gets support from Europe.

The key problem is that the French authorities are not pulling their weight despite being given millions of pounds from the UK taxpayer.

You don’t have to go far to see stories suggesting the French aren’t really giving the issue the attention it merits. Images of French immigration officials, soldiers and police standing back and watching groups clambering onto dinghies attest to the futility of those who try to intervene.

Still, we may see some impetus on new legal powers that would enable the French to intervene directly and tackle the phenomenon of so-called ‘taxi boats.’

But the choppy waters around the issue remain: will the government be able to hail success in curbing the numbers by the time of the next election? On present form, you would have to say it is doubtful.