Migration

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Wednesday 16th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am very happy to do so. We have been working bilaterally, particularly with our French colleagues, to break a number of criminal gangs. We did that over the first few months of the year and quite a number of gangs were dealt with, but there are more out there that we need to deal with. We are putting support into the JOT Mare operation, run by Europol, which enables the sharing of intelligence on such matters. It is important that everybody participates in this. We have put effort into it and I have been encouraging my European counterparts to do the same, because we need a collective effort across the European Union. The National Crime Agency and Immigration Enforcement have set up a new organised immigration crime taskforce, to which 90 people are assigned, not only in the UK but elsewhere in Europe and in Africa, to help identify the criminal gangs and take action.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I, too, welcome the appointment of the shadow Home Secretary and pay tribute to the former shadow Home Secretary for the work that she has done. I warmly welcome the appointment of the Minister with responsibility for Syrian refugees. He has a good record of dealing with the diaspora community in north London and I think he will do an excellent job.

My concern has to do with the criminal gangs, which were just raised by the hon. Member for Wealden (Nusrat Ghani). We are not part of Schengen, so we are not part of the rapid border intervention team deployments, but we need to provide support to break the criminal gangs. That means that there must be a 24/7 operation, because criminal gangs do not operate to Brussels office hours; it is something that they do all the time. What support will the Home Secretary give the Tunisian Government? I was in Tunis last Thursday where they are intercepting Libyan boats that are trying to get to Italy. Without supporting the Tunisians, we will not be able to defeat the criminal gangs.

[Mrs May]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I am tempted to say that very few of us work to Brussels office hours, but he is absolutely right that it has to be a 24/7 operation. We need co-operation across Europe, but we also need to work with the countries in Africa where the criminal gangs are operating. That is why the National Crime Agency has ensured that its new organised immigration crime taskforce has people in Africa who are able to work at a local level, with European input, to break the criminal gangs.

We also have the proposal from the European Union, which has been masterminded by High Representative Federica Mogherini, to take action off the Libyan coast through the common security and defence policy. Of course, that depends on the consent of the Libyan Government. As the right hon. Gentleman will know, that is not something that is possible at the moment, but work on the stability of Libya is part of the important work that needs to go on.