Migrant crisis: Insider lays bare immense scale of people smuggling operation

He is a key contact, with intimate knowledge of people smuggling operations within Northern France.

But it's difficult to tell you any more about what he does, for fear of exposing him, and putting him at risk.

Suffice to say, he's able to provide us with valuable insight into the way in which the criminal people smuggling gangs operate, and the ongoing efforts of UK and French law enforcement to combat them.

And from his very first answer, a sobering assessment of the organised criminals behind this multi-million-pound illegal trade.

Curtis says it would be easy, but wrong to imagine them as being based out there in France, running their operation from the camps.

"This operation is run from the UK." He said.

"It's not run from Turkey, or Iran, or Iraq. The main criminal operation is run from the UK, using go-betweens out in Iran, Iraq and various other countries.

"There are lots of different routes into Europe and across to the UK, depending on how much a person can afford.

"For instance, there are yachts that leave a specific location on the Turkish coast. They will go to a quiet spot in Greece for migrants who can only afford the small price for that part of the crossing into the European Union.

"So, then they're effectively on their own afterwards, and can attempt to make their own way up into Northern Europe."

Curtis told me there were currently two of these yachts he knows about that are running that route between Turkey and Greece, carrying around 140 migrants each time.

"Many migrants have all or part of their journey paid for by agreeing to work off their ticket when they get to the UK.

"That can mean some are working for years to pay off that debt. In fact, I know one guy, who's been working in a car wash for a few years, and he's still only paid off a small amount of that debt he owes the smuggling gang, he's effectively stuck there."

According to Curtis, there are broadly two categories of people smuggler.

"There's your professional, who doesn't want people to die. Not out of any sense of benevolence, but because it's bad for business.

"And then there's your opportunists. They don't care about the consequences or the longer-term business model."

There are, he said, about half a dozen "professional smuggling gangs" that transport 9 and 11-meter-long inflatables.

"The boats are made to order in back street factories in China and then sent to Turkey.

"From there, they're transported inside vehicles, mainly to garages and safe houses in and around Germany."

The people smuggling gangs are now so sophisticated, their operations are timed to the minute.

They hire professional advisers, plugged into Met Office weather and tidal information.

When conditions in the English Channel are assessed as being passable, the call goes out to ship the boats' component parts to northern France.

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"It's like clockwork," Curtis says.

"It's around a 5 to 6 hour's drive from the locations in Germany to the shores of northern France.

"As the call goes out to certain groups of migrants in the camps, they're taken to meet the boat at a specific location. It's assembled in front of them in just 15 minutes, ready to be carried to the water."

Curtis said that while opportunist smugglers will attempt to launch in any given weather window, the more sophisticated smuggling operators wait until they've sold about 600 tickets, or 10 boats worth of migrants.

"They'll then launch those 10 boats from multiple locations along the coastline, knowing that most will make it."

He said that the smuggling gangs now often alert French police to one or two of the launches, ensuring police concentrate on those locations, greatly increasing the chances that the bulk of the other boats make it across.

"The UK and other European authorities have become much better at disrupting some of the smuggling operations.

"Periodically, you'll see a smuggling operation targeted, multiple arrests, and supply lines disrupted.

"That really does make a difference, but usually only for relatively short periods of time, before the smugglers adapt and overcome, opening up new operations, with new supply lines."

It is still the Kurdish gangs who control most of the people smuggling operations across the Channel, Curtis says.

As they become even more organised in their pursuit of profit, he tells us they're now tapping into the world of business, looking for "legitimate investors."

"The Kurdish gangs will tend to stay within their own cultural ties.

"So for instance, they might offer a Kurdish Iranian businessman the opportunity to invest say £10,000 for two boats. And the return for that would be astronomical."

With ticket prices on the boats between £3,000 - £5,000, a boat with 50 migrants onboard would make between £150,000 and £250,000.

A couple of years back, Albanian criminal gangs tried and failed to take over control of the people smuggling operations in northern France from the Kurds.

The Albanians now use the Kurds as facilitators. Curtis says the Albanians are smart businessmen and are prepared to play the long game.

Besides, he says Albanians very rarely use small boats to cross the Channel now, since the UK government signed a returns agreement with the government in Tirana.

Curtis claims the Albanians are still coming to the UK though, but now it's in the back of lorries.

"The Albanians will look for lorry drivers in Eastern Europe, usually Polish drivers, and pay them to smuggle people over Europe and across the Channel to the UK.

Although the Albanian and Kurdish criminal gangs have reached an agreement, Curtis predicts more trouble in the year ahead as others try for a slice of the lucrative smuggling trade.

"There's a big African contingent trying to muscle in on some of the boat smuggling operations.

"In particular, there's one Eritrean gang, who are being leaked some of the GPS coordinates of where some boats are launching from.

"We've seen incidents of African migrants turning up at those locations and attacking those who've paid for journeys across the Channel, trying to force their way onto the boats.

"There have been a number of recent incidents where African migrants have been found dead on some of the local beaches, where we think they've turned up, attempted to force their way on the boats and it's ended badly for them."

Curtis said the Eritrean smuggling gangs are building up sophistication, and "they will get there."

"The trouble is, they place a very low value on life, and will be willing to take many more risks than the more organised and cautious Kurdish gangs."

With thousands of migrants staying in dozens of makeshift camps around Calais and Dunkirk, Curtis told us those camps would remain full over Winter.

"They have no choice, they have to stay around the camps, close to the coastline, as they never know when they'll get the call from the gang masters telling them it's their turn to run to the beach to catch their boat."

I'm glad Curtis eventually agreed to speak to me. He has valuable insight on the ever-changing situation on the other side of the Channel.

I hope to hear more from him in the year ahead, on a criminal network the UK government is determined to tackle, but one Curtis says is now highly sophisticated and massively difficult to control.