'Madness!' Illegal immigrants dodge deportation after 'two-tier' Sentencing Council 'blows hole' through border enforcement

Research conducted by the Shadow Justice Secretary showed the number of criminals sentenced for such offences stood at 120 between June 2022 and December 2022, potentially letting hundreds of offenders off the hook.

In its new guidelines, the Sentencing Council also included "first offences" as a mitigating factor, with jail time being slashed for a range of immigration-related offences.

The quango's "starting points" for sentences falls below the cut-off point of 12 months in prison, which is the threshold for migrants to automatically face deportation.

Custodial sentences could also fall well-short of the punishments set out under the Nationality & Borders Act.

The Sentencing Council's custody range of 10 to 16 years for people smuggling is significantly lower than the life imprisonment sentence included in the Nationality & Borders Act for facilitating entry to the UK.

Responding to the guidance, Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick warned the proposals would "blow a hole" in Britain's border controls.

He said: "The guidelines the Sentencing Council have drafted will blow a hole in border enforcement. Yet again they are acting in a way that disregards Parliament’s will.

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"That’s why I brought forward a Bill to restore ministerial oversight to the Council, but shamefully Labour opposed it.

"The Justice Secretary has chosen to be powerless to stop madness like this and the two-tier sentencing rules."

Jenrick previously took aim at the Sentencing Council after it was revealed that new rules would give special treatment to criminals from ethnic, religious and gender minorities.

Courts have controversially been told they should “normally consider” ordering a pre-sentence report on an offender if they come from “an ethnic minority, cultural minority, and/or faith minority community”, or are transgender.

Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood eventually expressed her "displeasure" at the moves and said it amounted to "differential treatment".

Despite the immigration guidelines being unveiled in March 2024, officials only discussed the proposals following July's General Election.

"Shabana Mahmood’s personal representative was present at all meetings and no objections are minuted," a Conservative spokesman said.

The Home Office has admitted that 6,000 small boat migrants have arrived on British shores since the start of 2025.

There were 129 arrivals on Tuesday, bringing the tally to a record level for this stage of the calendar year at 6,049.

Despite Sir Keir Starmer pledging to "smash the gangs", GB News also revealed that more than 30,000 small boat migrants have completed the perilous 21-mile journey since Labour came to power.

A Sentencing Council spokesman said: "These are draft guidelines which have not yet been published as definitive guidelines.

"As with all our guidelines they must follow legislation set by Parliament.

"When drafting guidelines, the Council sets sentencing levels having regard to current sentencing practice as required by statute and generally the Council’s aim when producing sentencing guidelines is to maintain current levels of sentencing.

"This approach was taken when producing the draft immigration guidelines. The guidelines as a whole are designed to cover the full range of offending from the least to the most serious, while leaving headroom for the very most extreme offences.

"Judges and magistrates can sentence outside guidelines if they feel it is in the interests of justice to do so."