“The British people want to stop the boats. They want to stop the abuse of our laws. The British people want to stop £6 million worth of their money being spent every day on hotel accommodation.”
Home Secretary, Suella Braverman says she’s “disappointed” with Gary Lineker – after the BBC presenter likened her comparison of the new plans to tackle the small boats crisis to Nazi Germany.
Speaking to GB News, Ms Braverman said:
“I’m disappointed about Gary Lineker. His attempt to somehow equate my bill with 1930s Germany, I don’t think that comparison is fair or appropriate. But what I believe is that I’ve won the moral argument already.
“I believe that this is what the British people want. I believe that they want us to take a firm but fair approach in relation to illegal migration.”
She added: “They want to stop the boats. They want to stop the abuse of our laws. The British people want to stop £6 million worth of their money being spent every day on hotel accommodation.
“They want to stop the expenditure of £3 billion a year on this asylum issue. We need to ensure that we have the right powers and indeed the duties which is what this bill will introduce to make sure that if you arrive here illegally, you’ll be detained and swiftly removed.”
Meanwhile, Ms Braverman also insisted the Government’s new plan to tackle immigration is already working, Home Secretary Suella Braverman has insisted.
She told GB News: “We are facing a global migration crisis. When I speak to my counterparts across the European Union they are largely facing very similar problems with unprecedented numbers of illegal migrants, and insufficient accommodation for them in which to house them.
“It’s an unsustainable problem and we’ve seen tragically, people die. This is a very complex but incredibly serious situation.
“Now it’s right that we take necessary, proportionate and compassionate measures to deter people from taking this journey in the first place.”
Responding to Eamonn Holmes in an interview during Breakfast on GB News, who questioned whether anything will change, she said: “That’s why we’ve introduced measures yesterday…we’re going to be changing our laws so that you can’t come here and illegitimately claim asylum.
“We’re changing our laws so that you’ll be swiftly processed, you’ll be swiftly removed from the United Kingdom, if you get on a boat and you come here unlawfully.
“We’ll be smashing the people smuggling gangs because they are a root cause of this problem that we’re seeing so holistically, our measures will take us forward in terms of empowering the Home Office, the authorities to take a more robust, but also necessary approach to illegal migration.”
Asked if she and the Prime Minister would resign if the plan failed, she said: “As the Prime Minister has made clear, he makes promises that he can deliver and he’s going to deliver the promises that he makes and I echo that sentiment.
“Stopping the boats is one of his top five priorities and we are making that promise because we believe we’ve got a good plan. We’re already seeing some progress.
“We’re already making progress on bearing down on our asylum backlog. We’ll be bringing forward new asylum accommodation.
“We have already got an agreement with France and with Albania, and we’re affecting relocations to Albania. We’re going to France at the end of this week to enhance our cooperation.
“So we’re already seeing progress since December. I’m confident that we can build on that progress and get where we need to be on this issue.”
On clearing the asylum backlog, she said: “I too am very frustrated and indeed worried about the thousands of people who are accommodated in hotels around towns and cities in the United Kingdom.
“And I understand that that places undue pressure on local resources, undue tensions within communities, it’s an unsustainable situation. So that’s why we need to take these measures.
“Our bill will apply retrospectively so that anybody who arrives from the date of introduction or our bill yesterday, they will be caught by our new laws when they become effective later this year.
“But it’s clear that we need to ensure that we can operationalise our partnership with Rwanda. Once we complete the process in the courts, I’m confident we will be able to relocate people to Rwanda, a safe country, a country that is supporting us through our partnership, and one with whom we are proud to work.”
