MOD Bicester and Illegal Migrants

Debate between John Hayes and Anna Turley

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Anna Turley]

I appreciate the hon. Lady. Of course, I will come on to Piddington—that is the content, the subject and the title of this debate—but it is really important to understand the people we are talking about having to house, how we are having to house them and the issues we are dealing with. I am proud of the steps we have taken to reduce that number so that we can hopefully reduce the number of people dependent on asylum accommodation as we go forward.

In partnership with French law enforcement, we have now stopped more than 50,000 attempted channel crossings. As a result, small boat arrivals are down around 40% on last year and asylum claims are down by 20%—real action, real results.

The task of responding to large-scale movements of people is one that we share with many Governments across the globe. It is, without question, one of the defining challenges of our age and to meet it we must work with source, transit and destination countries alike. That is why the Government have made it a priority to strengthen our co-operation with a range of international partners, striking new agreements and strengthening existing partnerships.

Just last month, the Home Secretary signed an agreement with her Belgian counterpart to intensify UK-Belgium co-operation and tighten the net around criminal gangs behind small boat crossings. We are taking our partnership with France further, following the new deal signed in April. French boots on the ground have already increased by 24% and a further 50 specialist officers will now be deployed on high-risk red days when conditions indicate crossings are likely, doubling the size of the current unit. First, by disrupting the movements of goods and infrastructure, tackling the gangs across borders and working with our international partners, we are reducing the flow of people heading towards our borders. Secondly, as the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Dr Mullan) flagged, we are addressing the pull factors that fuel illegal migration, and we are enforcing the laws of this land.

To live in this country is a privilege, but it comes with responsibilities. When people abuse our hospitality, staying for longer than they are entitled to or committing criminal offences in our communities, the public rightly expect every effort to be made to remove them from British soil. That is why the total failure to remove illegal migrants and foreign offenders in the years before the general election was so damaging, and why the Government are putting right the wrongs of the past.

[Sir John Hayes]

The Minister is of course right that international co-operation matters in terms of dealing with these things, particularly channel crossings, but the point made earlier was that where countries refuse to take back their nationals who have committed crimes here, we should take further action, should we not? Part of that might be cutting aid or dealing with visas, as has been suggested. There are all kinds of other levers that can be used by Government to tell those countries, “You’ve got to take them back, because they’re not our responsibility and we’re not going to pay for them any more.”

[Anna Turley]

I think we are in danger of having a rare moment of cross-party consensus and agreement, because that is something the Government are already taking many steps towards. We are looking at visa enforcements. We have already had a number of successes on that front and will continue to use that, because where we see countries refusing to take people back, we have those levers within our power and we are using them.