THE Government is to blame for illegal migrants crossing the English Channel because it is not tackling people smugglers, Labour has claimed.
Labour chair Anneliese Dodds MP was commenting on the Home Secretary’s trip to Washington to argue that some international treaties on immigration are no longer fit for purpose.
She told GB News: “International conventions are not the reason why the Conservative government is failing in particular to take action against the international people smuggling gangs, are not the reason why the Conservative government has such chaos in the asylum system.
“They’re not the reason why British taxpayers are paying £8 million a day on accommodation. I’m afraid the responsibility for all of this lies squarely with the Conservative government.”
In a discussion during Breakfast with Eamonn Holmes and Isabel Webster, she added: “We’ve seen convictions for people smugglers going down significantly under the Conservatives. We’ve seen the rates of returns of people whose applications have failed also going down precipitously, down by 70%.
‘I’m afraid the reason for these problems is that [this] Conservative government that doesn’t have a plan, we have huge amounts of rhetoric, constant rhetoric from the Home Secretary, but no delivery.
“Labour’s got a plan that we would be enacting right now to get a grip on this. That’s the difference between Labour and the Conservatives.”
She added: “There’s a huge amount of talk from the Conservative government, but their delivery is absolutely woeful.”
