Labour Under Fire as Small Boat Numbers Soar and Old Excuses Resurface

With small boat crossings already soaring and expected to break all previous records, Labour is starting to feel the pressure as its strategy, or lack of one, is being called into serious question. Behind the scenes, MPs are reportedly growing nervous about how high the numbers will go this year, with the 50,000 mark looming uncomfortably on the horizon.

Publicly, there’s a lot of finger-pointing and deflection. The official line from the Government is that everything hinges on the new law enforcement powers soon to come into play. But let’s be honest — that sounds more like wishful thinking than a solid plan. Taxpayers are footing a £4.7 billion annual hotel bill for migrants, and even the most loyal Labour backbenchers are beginning to wonder how things got to this point, and why, during their years in opposition, the best they came up with was a catchy slogan rather than a real strategy.

And then there’s Keir Starmer’s increasingly desperate attempt to find a new country willing to take on the role of a UK migrant hub, after binning the Rwanda deal on day one. With no clear alternative in place, it’s looking more like panic than leadership, reported GB News.

Meanwhile, the old arguments are being dusted off, as the political blame game heats up. Some have started pointing fingers at everything from the weather to Brexit, Boris, and even Nigel Farage. And now, right on cue, some are making the case that leaving the EU is to blame, claiming that if we were still part of the Dublin Agreement, the small boats issue would somehow be fixed.

The idea being floated is that under EU rules, France would be obliged to take back migrants arriving by boat, and the problem would vanish. But that’s not how the Dublin Regulations ever worked — and it certainly wouldn’t have stopped the surge in crossings we’re seeing today.

The Dublin Agreement, in theory, laid out which EU country was responsible for processing an asylum claim. If someone arrived in Italy, that’s where they were supposed to stay and wait for a decision. But what’s happened in reality is very different. Many migrants have simply skipped making a claim at all in the first country they reach, heading instead straight to the place they really want to be — the UK included.

Even when transfer requests were made, the system relied on other EU countries accepting those requests, and that rarely happened. Border countries like Greece, Italy, Bulgaria, and Spain were under pressure and had the option to refuse — which they often did. So, the numbers were never significant. In the final three years the UK was part of Dublin, it actually took in far more people than it sent back:

In 2018, 1,215 came in and only 209 were sent out.
In 2019, 714 came in and 263 were sent out.
And in 2020, 882 came in with just 105 going the other way.

Meanwhile, small boat crossings jumped from fewer than 300 in 2018 to around 7,500 in 2020 — showing that even while the agreement was in place, it had no meaningful impact on the boats.

The idea that Brussels would have fixed this crisis is pure fantasy. The Dublin Agreement didn’t force France to stop the crossings then, and it wouldn’t now. It’s just another distraction from a Government that’s running out of answers.

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