Shabana Mahmood: Teething Troubles with One in, One Out Deal.

Keir Starmer did a deal with French President Emmanuel Macron. The agreement is one in, one out. In other words, we send a migrant back to France, and we accept one from France. Or at least that's the basic theory of it. So illegal migrants can be removed from Britain, and an equal number can come to Britain via the legal route. However, some have questioned the logic of this. Surely a sound policy would be stop or at least deter migrants from crossing the English Channel in the first place. The Channel is the busiest or one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world, so dinghies stacked up with people are taking a hell of a risk. There have been no collisions with shipping as far as I know; however, dinghies have capsized with fatalities. Mr. Starmer was also supposed to be cracking down on the gangs exploiting migrants, but how well that has gone, I cannot say.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who some see as a future Labour leader (she's been compared to Maggie Thatcher, well, we'll see how that plays out!), has admitted more boat people have arrived than have been sent back. Since September, 10,000 people have arrived in small boats. Ms. Mahmood said there have been teething troubles with the scheme in the early days. In the beginning, the French apparently struggled to find migrants who wanted to come to Britain legally. Why that should be is best known only to the French or Ms. Mahmood. Perhaps the legal route takes too long. For example, do they have family already settled here, in which case, why didn't they try the legal route in the first place? Are they genuinely fleeing persecution? Or are they just coming here because they think the UK is flowing with milk and honey? France is a perfectly safe nation for them to reside in, but they would rather come here. Based on the belief that the British welfare system is generous, they get accommodation, etc, etc. There is some truth to this, but it's not all the truth.

Going back to the numbers arriving and the numbers leaving Ms. Mahmood admitted 281 migrants had been sent back in the 5 months since the scheme began. However, since the inception of the agreement, 350 have arrived illegally. According to GB News, a right-wing news outlet in the UK, this is a discrepancy of 69 people. Labour knows that one of its Achilles heels is on migration, whether it be legal or illegal. Reform UK are the greatest threat to both the Conservatives and the current Labour government. Dealing with migration and immigration is what is making them popular. Farage and his band of brothers are on about deporting even those who have been settled here. Finding reasons to deport them. Is that going towards the policy of reimmigration as espoused by the AFD of Germany? Some would say yes, it is approaching that.

Immigration and migration, legal or otherwise has always divided opinion in Britain. And now the issue of migrants has created an even more toxic environment in the UK. You have people like Zack Polanski of the Greens extolling the benefits of migration. Whereas Nigel Farage of Reform UK is saying the opposite. And both parties, as I said earlier, are a big threat to both Labour and the Conservatives. Polankski and the Green Party want to overtake Labour as the major party on the left. Likewise for Nigel Farage and the Reform Party regarding Conservatives on the right.

Meanwhile, Labour is the government now and is the one apparently dealing with this.