Michelle Dewberry has spoken out on reaching a “regretful conclusion” on stopping the boats as Rishi Sunak continues to face intense scrutiny over his handling of the matter.
The Prime Minister pledged to halt the tide of migrants crossing the Channel, something he has so far failed to do.
Despite his best efforts to establish a deterrent with the Rwanda policy, legal blockages and ramped up operations from traffickers have only served to intensify the Prime Minister’s struggles.
The number of Channel crossings is approaching 30,000 for the year, and Sunak has admitted there is “no firm date” for meeting the promise he made at the start of 2023.
Michelle Dewberry has hit out at the Government’s handling of the migrant crisis
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GB News presenter Michelle Dewberry says there is only “one way” to stop the boats, and that includes introducing an effective deterrent.
“I’ve reached quite a regretful conclusion, it brings me no pleasure in suggesting this”, she said.
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“The more I think about this, the more I talk to people about this, the more I sit and listen to different people’s ideas and all the rest of it, I have now concluded there is only one way that you would ever be able to properly stop these boats.
“That would be to try and deploy some so-called turn back operation.
“If people genuinely understood, if you get on that boat, it doesn’t matter who you are or what your story is, there is no way at all you will be taken or make it halfway and end up in the UK.”
Although Channel crossings have fallen by a third since 2022, some 29,437 people have still made the journey so far this year.
Sunak was asked by Home Affairs Committee chair Dame Diana Johnson when he would have “stopped the boats”, the Prime Minister said: “There isn’t a firm date on this because I’ve always been clear from the beginning.
“We will keep going until we do. This isn’t one of these things when there’s a precise date estimate on it, this is something where before I took this job they had only ever gone up, now they’re down by a third.”
The Government’s Safety of Rwanda Bill passed its second reading in the Commons on December 12 and will be discussed by a committee of MPs in the new year.
Sunak told the Liaison Committee he was “always happy to engage with colleagues” on the contents of the Bill, but would not commit to a specific timetable for the Bill.
He also declined to discuss the cost of the scheme, now expected to exceed £290 million, saying secrecy was necessary as the Government might “want to have other conversations with other countries” about similar schemes.
Sunak was unable to say when he would clear the backlog of asylum claims, which stood at 109,442 cases at the end of November.
