Cruise ships could be used to process rescued migrants, former MOD boss suggests
Requisitioned cruise ships could be used as floating holding bays for migrants, the former director-general of the Ministry Of Defence (MOD) has suggested.
Rear Admiral Chris Parry said that the Government needed to look to "innovative solutions" to solve the migrant crisis in the Channel.
He suggested out of use cruise liners could be used to process those picked up by the Border Force, rather than officials “providing a taxi service to dry land”.
He said: "One of the things that I've been looking at this week is employing one of the many unemployed cruise liners along the south coast.
“You take them to a cruise liner, you quarantine them, you give them medical checks, and then you can process them and those that can come to the UK come, and those that can't get returned.”
The former naval chief has suggested this could be a way around rules which dictate that migrants rescued in the English channel need to be taken directly to shore.
On Tuesday the UK will present the French with a plan for the Navy and Border Force vessels to intercept migrant dinghies and return them to Dunkirk in northern France.
Rear Admiral Parry hailed the Royal Navy’s involvement as a “terrific idea”.
“If you do deploy the Royal Navy what you're deploying is not just additional surveillance and intercept assets, you're actually deploying the talents of people who spend their whole lives at sea trying to solve complex problems,” he told LBC.
However, the French government wants the UK to contribute £30 million to patrol efforts. The plan to involve the Navy, and the requested millions, will be discussed during a meeting between Chris Philp, the Minister for Immigration Compliance and French interior minister Gérald Darmanin.
Mr Philp said the Government wants to make the route across the Channel "completely unviable" so migrants "have no incentive to come to northern France or attempt the crossing in the first place".
He said: “We intend to return as many migrants who have arrived as possible. There are return flights planned in the coming days. And we will also continue to go after the heinous criminals and organised crime networks putting people's lives at risk."
However, the French Interior Ministry insisted on Sunday that they had played their part, stating that their border officials had prevented 10 times more migrant Channel crossings in July this year than a year earlier.
The ministry claims the French authorities are “fully mobilised” to prevent migrants taking to the sea, blaming the favourable weather for an increase in attempts to cross.
Additional French forces have been deployed to monitor the coast and more than 1,000 migrants have been moved away from the shoreline in the past three weeks.
The ministry says next week’s meeting will aim to agree a joint strategy, with France pushing for a coordinated European response to the “global” problem of migration.
The talks come as it emerged that over 4,000 migrants have now reached the UK in 2020 by crossing the English Channel in small boats.
The MP for Dover Natalie Elphike yesterday attacked French demands for a further £30 million of financial support, saying the Channel crossings are "a French issue as much as it's a British one" and noting the UK is already "paying millions of pounds to the French".
Britain has so far paid more than £100 million to fund the French response to the migrant crisis.
