Let's assume Sir Keir Starmer wishes to win the next election. Let's likewise assume he has no desire to be changed as Prime Minister in the next year or so by Wes Streeting or Angela Rayner or anyone else.
He's a politician, after all, and politicians enjoy power - Starmer more than the majority of, I would believe. I likewise recommend that he's at least averagely intelligent, and must be able to weigh up the chances of any policy prospering.
After the battles, compromises and humiliations associated with attaining high office, Starmer has no objective of throwing everything away. Why, then, does he show every sign of doing so?
On the single issue that may matter most to a bulk of voters, he is speeding towards certain disaster, while denying himself any possibility of an escape path. I indicate the boats stumbling upon the Channel.
Numbers of migrants doing the 21-mile journey are up by 42 percent on the same duration in 2015. An analysis by The Times, utilizing comparable modelling as Border Force, anticipates that 50,000 people will cross the Channel in small boats in 2025. That would be a - and a stonking ordeal for Sir Keir.
Peering into his mind, I reckon there are two main possible descriptions for his behaviour. One is that he is deluding himself. He actually thinks numbers will boil down as soon as the measures he has taken start to work.
If Starmer still thinks that his policies - throwing hundreds of millions at the French authorities, enhancing intelligence and using boosted police powers - will decrease the numbers, that actually is the victory of hope over experience. The other possibility is that he is currently starting poorly to realise that his stratagems will not bear much, if any, fruit. So he and the Government have actually decided to pull the wool over our eyes. A fatal technique.
There have been two such examples in recent days. Having said in an online post on Monday that he felt 'mad' about the numbers crossing the Channel (how does he believe the rest of us feel !?) the PM made a slippery claim.
Sir Keir Starmer now has absolutely nothing powerful in his locker, Stephen Glover writes
Only 2,240 small-boat migrants were sent out home in the 12 months to March, 3 percent less than in the previous year
He boasted that 'nearly 30,000 individuals' had actually been gotten rid of from the UK by this Government. Sounds good. But in fact this figure refers to all kinds of migrants who have no right to be in our nation. Only 2,240 small-boat migrants were sent home in the 12 months to March, 3 percent less than in the previous year.
A lie? Good God no! We mustn't accuse Labour prime ministers, far less Sir Keir Starmer KCB, PC, KC, MP, of telling deliberate fibs. Shall we choose a statistical sleight of hand?
The other circumstances of the Government not being totally directly was the Home Office's claim earlier today that there have actually been more migrants this year because of balmy weather. These are called 'red days', when the sea is calm.
But an analysis by my coworker David Barrett in yesterday's Mail shows that in temperate May in 2015 there were 21 'red days' however only 2,765 arrivals, about 1,000 less than last month. In gentle June 2024 there were 20 'red days', though just 3,007 migrants were recorded crossing the Channel.
The most probable description is that last May and June the Government's strategy to send out illegal migrants to Rwanda had actually lastly cleared persistent judicial blockage. Some, a minimum of, were prevented from crossing the Channel for worry of being loaded off to the main African nation.
The Rwanda plan was far from perfect - it was expensive, and responsible to legal difficulty due to the fact that the nation has an authoritarian federal government - but at least it had some prospect of discouraging migrants. The incoming Labour Government discarded its only plausible means of suppressing the boats.
Good for Tory leader Kemi Badenoch, who in a speech tomorrow will carry out to reanimate a plan strikingly similar to the Rwandan one.
Starmer now has nothing formidable in his locker. Literally absolutely nothing. He can offer more millions to the French government but it will not make much, if any, difference. French authorities will still loll around on beaches, thinking of the sand castles they made as children, as they watch migrant boats setting off for Dover.
The fact is that the French will never strain themselves due to the fact that every migrant who leaves their shores is one less migrant for them to fret about. It is naive to envision that they are ever going to be zealous on our behalf.
STEPHEN GLOVER: Keir Starmer is a soft male who can not comprehend the real wicked Britain is dealing with
Nor will Sir Keir's idea of enhancing intelligence and law enforcement be definitive. When it comes to Labour's reported objective to tinker with Article 8 of the Human Rights Act so as to prevent phony asylum claims, that is welcome, however even if it ends up being law it is not likely to have much impact on general numbers.
Are the PM and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper starting to stress as they realise they do not have a single policy likely to satisfy their pledge of 'smashing the gangs'? If they aren't desperate, they jolly well ought to be.
Three weeks earlier, Sir Keir was embarrassed after he had actually praised talks over Rwanda-style 'return hubs' only minutes before his Albanian counterpart, standing a couple of feet away, ruled out any cooperation.
Maybe the Government will convince the Kosovans or the North Macedonians to establish some sort of scheme. But if it does, it will take months, if not years, and individuals will question why Sir Keir cancelled an arrangement that he is at least partially attempting to revive.
I've no specific desire to toss Starmer a lifeline however, as I have actually recommended before, there's one possible path out of the hole he has actually dug for himself - though it would take huge determination and nerve for him to take it.
There are many uninhabited British islands off our coast and additional afield. Pick one of them. Create a camp similar to those on the Isle of Man that housed alien internees throughout the War. Build numerous huts - instead of putting up less sturdy tents, as ex-Reform MP Rupert Lowe has proposed.
Recruit physicians and officials to evaluate claims quicker than takes place at present - and after that return most migrants to where they came from. The expense of establishing such a camp would be a portion of the ₤ 4.3 billion invested in 2015 on housing migrants and asylum hunters.
Can anyone tell me why not? Few migrants would expensive kicking their heels for months in a camp, nevertheless humane, so it would be a wonderful deterrent. Cross the Channel, and you will be our visitor - on a potentially windy island instead of in a four-star hotel.
Granted, in order to ward off vexatious legal challenges we 'd most likely have to derogate from the European Court of Human Rights, which would be a step too far for our careful Prime Minister.
But he doesn't have a much better idea. In truth, he hasn't got any concepts at all that are accountable to stem the growing varieties of individuals streaming throughout the English Channel.
bloglines.com
Things can only worsen - and as they do Labour will sink ever lower in public esteem. Does Sir Keir Starmer really wish to be the signatory of his own political death warrant?
RwandaAngela RaynerLabourWes Streeting
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By not Stopping the Boats, pM is Signing his Political Death Warrant
Malcolm Hobson edited this page 2025-06-21 23:46:48 +08:00