The optics are bad for Sunak... but both parties will struggle to stop the boats - analysis by Katherine Forster
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Who would have thought it? In Dover yesterday morning, there was Natalie Elphicke, the local, notably right-wing MP on the front line of the small boats crisis, singing the praises of her leader, down on the Kent coast for a big announcement on ‘Stopping the Boats’.
Only that leader was Sir Keir Starmer. Elphicke had spectacularly ‘crossed the floor’ on Wednesday, defecting to ‘a changed Labour party’. Under the Prime Minister’s leadership, she now says the Conservatives have become ‘a by-word for incompetence and division’.
Tory MPs are flabbergasted and cross. And many Labour MPs aren’t happy either.
But the calculation is that voters will just see a Tory MP turning to Labour for border security.
The optics are pretty damning. And Labour has now parked its tanks firmly on the Conservative lawn.
Traditionally of course, the Tories are more trusted on borders than Labour, and the Brexit rallying cry, to ‘take back control’ included, crucially, taking back control of our borders.
To date, the government has very visibly failed with that. Over nine thousand have crossed the Channel illegally already this year, up a third on this point last year. Despite the many appearances at lecterns emblazoned with the words ‘Stop the Boats’ Sunak is not succeeding.
The Tories have clung to the line that Labour ‘don’t have a plan’.
But now Labour do. And they unveiled it yesterday in Dover.
Labour plans to tackle the small boats crisis through cracking down on the criminal gangs who get rich on human misery and desperation. Starmer promises a new Border Security Command, and one thousand more officers, recruited by MI5, the National Crime Agency and Border Force.
There’s plans to work more closely with European allies, more intelligence sharing, plus increased use of anti-terror powers. They say they’ll use the £75million saved in not sending people to Rwanda.
Better, they reason, to stop people crossing the Channel illegally in the first place, than worry about what to do with them when they are here.
The problem is of course, as Starmer admitted, that this stuff is hard. And the government already unveiled a similar scheme a year or so ago. Despite the constant focus on Rwanda, the Tories have many strands to their attempts to stop the boats. So much of this, with the exception of involving spies, feels familiar.
And then there’s Rwanda.
Sunak says there will be a ‘regular drumbeat of flights taking off throughout the summer’. Starmer now says he believes migrants will finally be sent.
But Labour will scrap it. Even if it’s working.
Starmer calls it ‘a gimmick’. And says Labour will scrap it ‘straight away’.
Though many are horrified by the whole notion of Rwanda, there will be plenty of voters outraged if it is working, and is ditched.
Labour also says they will appoint more case-workers and process claims quicker.
And Starmer, when pushed on numbers for what looks like success with channel crossings, wouldn’t go there. He said he would ‘like it to come down completely’ but clearly won’t set a target.
Perhaps he’s learnt from Sunak’s pledge to ‘Stop the boats’.
The whole of Europe, and indeed the US, are grappling with rising levels of illegal migration. Other European countries are looking at processing asylum seekers offshore. And the numbers crossing the Mediterranean dwarf those attempting the Channel.
The government made Rwanda its flagship policy of many. Starmer says smashing the gangs is the solution.
But the truth is that whoever is in power is going to struggle with this. Regardless of their colour or ideology.
And, in Dover, the boats keep coming.