Oral Answers to Questions

Natalie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

I read with interest the report from the Select Committee, which makes several important points about greater collaboration and deeper co-operation with our friends in France. Last year our joint efforts saw more than 23,000 dangerous and unnecessary crossings prevented, and this year to date more than 30,000 crossing attempts have been stopped by the French. Joint working has also resulted in the dismantling of 55 organised crime groups and secured more than 500 arrests since its inception in 2020. That operational collaboration is absolutely integral to solving this common challenge.

[Mrs Natalie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Regrettably, the modest French agreement falls short of what is needed to address the scale, impact and urgency of the channel crossings issue. We do not need more observation—we need action taken on the French side. Even today, as the ink dried on this new deal, small boats crept through the sea-mist and one even landed on a beach in a residential coastal village in my constituency. Will my right hon. Friend meet me and Kent leaders to discuss the dreadful impact on local services, which they described in a letter to her two weeks ago as being at breaking point?

[Suella Braverman]

I thank my hon. Friend for all her work on this issue over several years. As I said, I am not going to overplay this agreement. It is an important step forward and provides a good platform on which to secure deeper collaboration, and it represents progress. For the first time, UK officers will be on the ground in France, working hand in hand with their French counterparts. They will be working side by side in the command HQ. They will be working with intelligence and surveillance material together. They will be partners in a very material sense in the fight against this challenge. Is that going to solve the problem on its own? It will not, but I encourage everybody to support the deal we have secured.