The home secretary has announced plans to recruit 100 investigators and intelligence officers to target people smuggling gangs as part of measures to clampdown on illegal migration.
Yvette Cooper said that the National Crime Agency (NCA) will find specialists to dismantle and disrupt organised immigration crime networks that exploit asylum seekers.
The plans were announced after immigration was forced to the top of the political agenda by this summer’s far-right riots.
Senior Labour figures remain acutely aware that failing to get to grips with immigration in general, and small boats in particular, will be exploited by opponents on the right such as Nigel Farage and his Reform UK party.
Cooper said she plans to achieve the highest rate of deportations since 2018 for refused asylum seekers, and said the Home Office will launch a new intelligence-driven illegal working programme to target employers who hire people with no right to be in the UK.
So far there have been nine returns flights in the last six weeks, including the largest-ever chartered return flight, the Home Office said.
Staff are being redeployed to increase the removal of refused asylum seekers, which has dropped by 40% since 2010, the Home Office said. Three hundred caseworkers have been reassigned to enforced and voluntary returns, it added.
The strategy is being overseen by Bas Javid, the Home Office’s director general for immigration enforcement and the brother of the former Tory chancellor Sajid Javid.
The NCA is leading around 70 investigations into major people smuggling and trafficking groups, the Home Office said.
Cooper said: “Our new border security command is already gearing up, with new staff being urgently recruited and additional staff already stationed across Europe. They will work with European enforcement agencies to find every route in to smashing the criminal smuggling gangs organising dangerous boat crossings.
“And by increasing enforcement capabilities and returns, we will establish a system that is better controlled and managed, in place of the chaos that has blighted the system for far too long.”
More than half of the passengers travelling to the UK on small boats have come from countries so unstable there is no chance they can be returned. They include Afghanistan, Iran, Eritrea, Syria, Iraq and Sudan. Almost all come from states with which the UK has no agreement to return those not granted asylum.
The Refugee Council has said that 36,000 asylum seekers are still living in unsuitable hotel rooms, at a cost of £5.3m each day.
On Monday, more than 200 people came to the UK via small boats – taking the total for the year to just under 20,000.
