Dover, United Kingdom – The UK detained its first group of asylum seekers on August 6 under the new UK-France migration deal. The controversial “one-in-one-out” pilot scheme aims to curb small-boat crossings across the Channel over the next 11 months.
The bilateral agreement, announced on July 10th, was described by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer as a “groundbreaking returns pilot.” Speaking to the UK’s House of Lords, French President Emmanuel Macron said the deal between the two nations would tackle irregular migration with “humanity, solidarity, and fairness”.
The “one-in-one-out” scheme, which came into force this week, will see France take back migrants who arrived at Britain irregularly and cannot prove family ties to the UK. In return, the UK will receive asylum seekers from France who have proven ties to the country and not previously attempted irregular entry.
Speaking to British television news outlet ITV News on August 7, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced:
“Yesterday, under the terms of this groundbreaking new treaty, the first group of people to cross the Channel were detained after their arrival at Western Jet Foil and will now be held in detention until they can be returned to France.”
The crackdown comes after a recorded 42,000 small-boat arrivals since Labour’s election in July 2024 – a 35% increase from the previous year.
Starmer claims that this deal will “fix the broken asylum system we inherited” and reduce the power of human smuggling networks.
The Labour government’s hardline approach to small boat crossings comes amid rising support for the far-right Reform UK party, which has made sweeping political gains in recent months, partly due to its strong anti-immigration rhetoric.
Criticisms of the UK-France Migrant Deal
Human rights groups in the UK have condemned the government’s deal, saying the policy will not reduce the scale of irregular migration but will only make the journey more deadly.
In a press release on August 7, Amnesty International UK’s Refugee and Migrant Rights Director, Steve Valdez-Symonds, said:
“The UK is shamefully using [refugees] as political pawns in a wider deterrence strategy. This reckless policy not only ignores the root causes of migration but risks pushing smugglers toward more dangerous and hidden routes.”
A spokesperson for the France-based refugee support charity Care4Calais told SkyNews the group would “consider” legal action “to oppose any plans that will put more lives at risk”.
Meanwhile, some UK Conservative Party critics have criticised the policy as not going far enough to sanction small-boat arrivals.
Speaking in a video posted on X, Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp asserted that the plan “won’t act as a deterrent,” claiming that “only 6% of arrivals” would be returned to France.
The UK government has not officially disclosed the planned number of returnees. However, speaking to BBC Breakfast, Cooper asserted that the scale of deportations would “build” over time.
Despite mounting criticisms, the UK and French governments insist that the agreement will deter people from making small boat crossings across the Channel by “show[ing] others trying to make the same journey that it will be in vain”.
This deal places the UK and France in line with other European nations, such as Greece, in an escalating trend toward restricting asylum migration to the continent.
Featured image credit:
Image: A group being brought in to the Border Force compound in Dover, Kent, after a small boat incident in the Channel on Wednesday.
Source: Gareth Fuller/PA
