Keir Starmer told stopping all small boats 'unrealistic' as PM's migrant record laid bare

However, while he said that the Home Office could ensure the people smuggling business model became "unviable" he conceded that it was unlikely for Labour to expect the number of crossings to drop to zero, as officers cannot control the French coastline.

Yesterday, 29,884 asylum seekers arrived on British shores between Labour's landslide election victory on July 4 last year and March 29, equating to just over 780 per week, compared to 570 for Rishi Sunak and 400 for Boris Johnson.

Small boat crossings have risen

PA/GB News

Major General Capps told The Times: "I think it will be very difficult, but if we can cut off the supply of boats and engines, the illegal manufacture of these, I think we could get it to a point where it’s just not viable.

"In a perfect world, we could disestablish the operation that I run so we don’t need to have that any more."

At a summit at Lancaster House yesterday, officials from social media companies Meta, X and TikTok were also invited to join discussions on how to crack down on the online promotion of irregular migration.

Capps encouraged Labour to get companies to remove adverts that promote the illegal journeys, adding: "If you’re a people smuggler, unlike a classic terrorist, you want to be seen, you want to be advertising. So I don’t think we’ve done enough previously to use that back against them."

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Former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak with director of Small Boats Operational Command (SBOC) Duncan Capps

PA

Opposition parties were quick to criticise the asylum seeker figure, with Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp claiming the surge came as a "direct consequence" of the decision to cancel the Rwanda scheme.

The Conservative MP for Croydon South told The Telegraph: "[Yesterday's] conference will make no difference. Law enforcement alone cannot stop illegal immigration – you need a removals deterrent."

Reform UK MP for Ashfield Lee Anderson said: "Labour's failure to control illegal migration is not just an issue of border security—it is a national crisis. As the numbers show, we are not receiving the best and brightest in terms of illegal migrants.

"No country has benefited from this level of unbridled immigration. It has placed a massive strain on our public services, our safety, and the pockets of our hardworking taxpayers."

Capps urged the importance of steering clear of simply displacing migrants on to other illegal routes into Britain.

He told The Times: "What we don’t want to do is just displace [migrants] into other vectors…because otherwise, obviously, all we’re doing is playing whack-a-mole."

Starmer also highlighted figures showing that between July 5 and March 22 there were 24,103 returns, including 6,339 enforced returns of people with no legal right to be in the UK, 3,594 foreign national offenders and 6,781 asylum-related returns.

He also pointed to international criminal investigations involving UK authorities, which were "beginning to bear fruit" stressing his commitment to tackling people smuggling in the same way as cross-border terrorism.