{"id":431655,"date":"2025-09-17T17:16:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T17:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/431655\/"},"modified":"2025-09-17T17:16:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T17:16:10","slug":"uk-border-force-collect-migrant-boats-from-french-waters-uk-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/431655\/","title":{"rendered":"UK border force collect migrant boats from French waters | UK | News"},"content":{"rendered":"

UK Border Force has been labelled \u201cabsolutely outrageous\u201d for travelling into French waters, collecting migrant boats<\/a> and taking them to Britain.<\/p>\n

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp was shocked to learn that the organisation tasked with protecting the country\u2019s borders was venturing into foreign territory to pick up those taking the deadly journey across the Channel.<\/p>\n

The Conservative MP made the discovery during a trip to see the chaos of the small boats up close on a fishing vessel, where he was shown pictures and historic data from a marine traffic app by skipper Matt Coker.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s absolutely outrageous that UK Border Force are apparently going into French waters, right next to French warships, to pick up illegal immigrants and ferry them to the UK,\u201d\u00a0 Chris Philp told the Express.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis summer, I witnessed first-hand what appears to be the French authorities facilitating illegal immigration. Both the police in northern France ushering illegal immigrants onto buses towards embarkation points, and French vessels ushering two migrant boats across the channel into British waters with no attempt to stop them.<\/p>\n

\u201cWorse still, I also obtained damning evidence of UK Border Force crossing all the way in to French waters to facilitate these illegal channel crossings.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo wonder this has been the worst year in history for illegal channel crossings \u2013 Labour are presiding over a full-blown borders crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf a dinghy gets into difficulty in French waters and there is a French warship right alongside them the French should be picking them up. The Home Secretary should instruct Border Force not to go into French waters to rescue illegal immigrants when there is a French vessel present.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeparately, all migrants picked up in any part of the channel (including in our waters) should be taken back to France in any event.\u201d<\/p>\n

Philp has written to the new Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, laying out the scale of the problem and calling for action on the issue.<\/p>\n

In the letter, seen by the Express, he tells Mahmood, who was drafted in to replace Yvette Cooper earlier this month: \u201cI hope that as Home Secretary you will instruct Border Force not to go into French waters when there is a French vessel present \u2013 whether to pick up illegal immigrants, escort them or otherwise assist with illegal entry into the UK.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cIt would be helpful if you would say the same to the RNLI (although I appreciate they are not under your jurisdiction.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Home Office has been contacted for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK Border Force has been labelled \u201cabsolutely outrageous\u201d for travelling into French waters, collecting migrant boats and taking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[47001,5502,146860,9895,40,5804,12,16,89794,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-431655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-chris-philp","10":"tag-english-channel","11":"tag-french-waters","12":"tag-illegal-immigration","13":"tag-immigration","14":"tag-migrant-crisis","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-uk-border-force","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115220773854192149","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}