Summary of the day
Thanks for following on an eventful Friday in which Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron held the first Franco-British summit in five years, hailing a thawing of relations, which they sought to exemplify through an exchange of rugby shirts.
Here are the main points from the day:
The main announcement from the summit was around strengthened cooperation on the issue of small boats crossing the Channel, which will lead to a new detention centre in northern France, a new command centre with enforcement teams in the same place for the first time, an extra 500 new officers patrolling French beaches, and more drones and surveillance technologies, all of which will be funded by the UK through a nearly half a million pound package. Nevertheless, it will not include an agreement for the UK to be able to return refugees to France, which Macron insisted must be negotiated at an EU level.
Charities were quick to criticise the announcement, saying the focus on more detention was disappointing and anti-refugee.
The two leaders also agreed upon further security cooperation aimed at bolstering Ukraine’s battlefield presence, including training marines. They also plan to increase the interoperability of the two countries’ forces, combine joint expedititionary forces, promote stability in the Indo-Pacific by coordinating carrier deployments and jointly explore the development of complex weapons, like air defence, combat air and long-range weapons.
Partnering on investment in renewable and nuclear energy to improve the two countries’ energy security and reduce cost pressure on citizens was also thrashed out.
Macron said that it was important to “fix the consequences of Brexit”, while Sunak affirmed that although the UK had left the EU, it hadn’t left Europe, and that “a close, cooperative, collaborative relationship with our European partners” should start with the UK’s nearest neighbour, France.
Speaking to reporters on the Eurostar to Paris in the morning, Sunak defended payments to France as “sensible investments for the UK” and said he was “throwing everything” at resolving the problem of small boats of migrants crossing the Channel. He added that security in Europe was “intertwined” with peace in the Indo-Pacific, and said China should stay out of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. He also said that the war in Ukraine would end at the negotiating table, and vowed to support Volodymyr Zelenskiy to be in the “best possible place to have those talks”.
The French press shared its enthusiasm for the meeting with a cover story on the left-leaning Libération newspaper that depicted the two leaders embracing in a chintzy mug. The pairing has swiftly been nicknamed “Le Bromance” in reflection of their similar age and professional background. Sunak tweeted that France and the UK were close neighbours, great friends and historic allies.
Thanks again for following today – we’ll see you on Monday.
Updated
UK to pay France nearly half a billion pounds to prevent Channel crossings
Britain will pay France nearly half a billion pounds over the next three years to step up efforts to prevent small boats from crossing the Channel, Rishi Sunak has announced.
PA reports:
The prime minister praised the “unprecedented” £478m (€541m) package to fund a new detention centre in France and hundreds of extra law enforcement officers on French shores.
Sunak announced the package after holding talks with Emmanuel Macron during a UK-France summit at the Élysée Palace in Paris on Friday.
The French president told Sunak the migration returns agreement that he covets under his pledge to “stop the boats” would have to be negotiated with the European Union rather than Paris.
The major new package comes on top of the more than £300m UK has committed to France in the last decade to help tackle unauthorised migration.
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Gary Lineker to step back from presenting after impartiality row
The BBC has tweeted that Gary Lineker will step back from presenting Match of the Day until an agreement is reached on social media use, after an impartiality row over comments he made criticising the government’s new asylum policy.
In a tweet, the presenter had compared the language used by the government to set out its plan to “that used by Germany in the 30s”.
Gary Lineker to step back from presenting Match of the Day until agreement reached on social media use - BBC statement https://t.co/WMsgqRzWrw
— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) March 10, 2023
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They might have nailed down important agreements on energy, security and immigration, but commentators have been quick to describe Sunak and Macron’s cordial relationship as “Le Bromance”.
The two politicians are a similar age and have a background in banking.
The friendship comes after relations turned cold between London and Paris during Boris Johnson and Liz Truss’s premierships, with rows over Brexit, fishing rights and the Aukus submarine deal between the UK, US and Australia.
The leaders exchanged rugby shirts before England’s clash with France at Twickenham on Saturday, part of the annual Six Nations tournament.
They were signed by the respective playing squads of the teams, No 10 confirmed.
Macron and Sunak both made jokes about France v England football and rugby clashes during the press conference, with the prime minister mentioning Les Bleus dumping Gareth Southgate’s footballers out of the World Cup in Qatar.
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Full Fact, an independent charity of fact checkers and campaigners, has found no evidence to support Rishi Sunak’s claim that there are now 6,000 fewer people in the caseload of the asylum backlog.
During prime minister’s questions on 8 March, Rishi Sunak claimed there were 6,000 fewer people in the caseload of the asylum backlog. Moments later, on the same subject, he said: “The backlog is down.”
If by the “asylum backlog” Sunak meant the number of people or cases waiting for decisions from the Home Office, then this was incorrect, according to the most recent published figures, Full Fact said. They show a large rise in December, of more than 17,000 people, compared with September 2022.
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Irish premier Leo Varadkar has said the UK would be required to engage with the European Union to resolve any issues about proposed new EU laws being introduced in Northern Ireland.
PA reports:
Varadkar made his comments a day after Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris suggested the UK government would be bound to veto any law if the Stormont brake element of the new Windsor Agreement was activated.
The framework will reduce the volume of Brexit red tape on the movement of GB goods bound for Northern Ireland that was created by the contentious Northern Ireland Protocol.
It also introduces a mechanism – the so-called Stormont brake – that enables a minority of Stormont MLAs to formally flag concerns about the imposition of new EU laws in Northern Ireland in a move that could ultimately lead to the UK government vetoing their introduction.
The DUP, which collapsed power-sharing in Northern Ireland in protest at the protocol, has yet to decide whether to back the Windsor Framework and return to devolution.
Speaking to reporters in Dublin, Varadkar was asked about Heaton-Harris’s comments.
He said:
I think what we’re going to have to see is the legislation that the British government introduces, and they’ve committed to consulting with the five main parties in Northern Ireland on that and also the Irish government.
We see the Stormont brake as a red flag mechanism, a mechanism by which 30 assembly members from two parties or more can raise an issue, an issue that we will then try to sort out between the EU and UK and that if things can’t be resolved we then go to international binding arbitrations, that’s how we would see it develop, that’s certainly how it’s written down in the legal text that was agreed between the EU and the UK.
But of course the UK can bring in its own internal legislation, but they have committed to consulting with the parties on that.
The Guardian’s France correspondent, Angelique Chrisafis, has more detail on the new detention centre agreed today:
The UK and France’s closer cooperation on migration issues around the Channel means that the UK will for the first time help to fund a detention centre in France.
The new centre will be located in the Dunkirk area of northern France. The UK funding will increase the number of places available for the French authorities to hold people who have no right to remain in France as they wait to be deported.
Updated
Charities criticise new detention centre as 'anti-refugee'
Charities are responding critically to the announcements from today’s summit, warning that the focus on more detention is “disappointing” and “anti-refugee”.
Christina Marriott, the executive director of strategy and communications at the British Red Cross, said:
The focus on more detention in today’s agreement with France is disappointing. It comes after the government’s proposals to stop people from claiming asylum in the UK earlier this week that we remain deeply concerned about. They would be ineffective, hugely expensive, and contrary to the international laws our country was once proud to have shaped. But most of all, this legislation would be devastating for the men, women, and children in need of our help.
We want to see a fast, fair but compassionate asylum system. But this week’s measures take us in a completely different direction. The government should focus its efforts on addressing the real problems with the system – like inefficiencies that have resulted in a backlog of 160,000 people waiting for a decision on their claim.
Amnesty International UK’s Steve Valdez-Symonds, its refugee and migrant rights director, said:
The UK and French governments should make an agreement to share responsibility for providing asylum to people – not more heartless anti-refugee measures that simply seek to absolve the UK from any responsibility at all.
Seeking asylum is a vital human right, not something that can be banned or withdrawn for political convenience.
The UK receives a relatively small number of the world’s refugees, and it increasingly treats these people atrociously – with ministers vilifying traumatised and marginalised people in the media and condemning them to months or even years of social isolation, deprivation and detention.
Fortress Britain policies won’t work and people will continue to drown in the Channel if ministers stubbornly refuse to make safe routes available to people seeking asylum – particularly when they have family or other strong connections here.
The government has deliberately destroyed its own asylum system and is now legislating to try to make that destruction permanent. Throwing more money at the French, the Rwandan or any other government cannot fix what the UK government has wrecked.
Without a major change of direction from Sunak and Braverman, the terrible consequences of their vandalism of human rights laws and the asylum system is set to get even worse.
Updated
In his closing remarks, Sunak said the breadth of the discussions today show how closely France and UK plan to work together.
We left the EU but we didn’t leave Europe.
We want to have a close, cooperative, collaborative relationship with our European partners and allies and of course that starts with our nearest neighbour, France.
We’re writing a new chapter in this relationship.
Sunak said the biggest driver of inflation and cost-of-living are energy prices.
He said one of the “practical, tangible” things to come out of the summit today was around more cooperation on energy security, bringing together researchers, businesses and the two governments.
We’re going to be able to get our citizens cheaper, cleaner and more secure energy faster.
We want to ease the pressures on the cost of living for them, the way to do that is to diversify and improve our supply of energy and accelerate that transition to net zero and we’ve made good progress on that goal today.
Macron: 'We have to fix the consequences of Brexit'
Macron said “we have to fix the consequences of Brexit”, many of which were “underestimated”, but which still need to be fixed through new close partnerships.
For our businesses and people, we want to build new links.
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Sunak says Channel crossings are a 'shared challenge'
Sunak stressed that work in Calais to dismantle criminal gangs and stop the crossing of small points are “joint efforts” and a “shared challenge”.
There’s no one solution to solving this very complicated problem, and it won’t be solved overnight.
He defended the UK’s £300m investment in French patrols as “good investments for the UK to make if they stop people coming and reduce pressure on our asylum system”.
Updated
Sunak added “we want Ukraine to win this war”, and right now that means “providing them with support, capabilities and training to mount a offensive and have decisive advantage on the battlefield”.
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Asked about comments from the Kremlin that a foreign hand is behind the building protest movement in Georgia, Macron said there was a tendency in Russia to see “any population movement as manipulation from outside”, but that he disagreed.
He said images coming out of Georgia were “worrying”, such as those of people carrying the EU flag being “pushed around”, which threatens freedom of speech. “Georgia is subject to very strong pressure,” he said.
On Ukraine, he said France’s priority at the moment is to help it conduct a military counter-offensive.
Asked about whether the UK and France will ever reach a deal where refugees arriving in the UK can be returned to France, Sunak there had been additional cooperation agreed today, and he expected this would developed further.
Conversations need to happen with other European countries, he said, and a new forum has been set up for that to happen.
Going forward there will be more that we can do.
Macron stressed this is not a UK-France agreement, but a UK-EU agreement, and there will be further discussions at an upcoming summit in Chisinau, Moldova.
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Macron is a “friend of Britain”, Sunak says, adding:
I feel very fortunate to be serving alongside you and incredibly excited about the future we can build together. Merci mon ami.
Some cultural partnerships have been agreed as well, including to make it easier for schoolchildren to go on exchanges, and for museum curators, artists and writers to collaborate together.
Sunak says the UK and France share a “special bond” and will “always be at the forefront of [our continent’s] defence” as two of the biggest defence powers in the world.
The pair have agreed to:
Train Ukrainian marines to give Ukraine a decisive advantage on the battlefield and for Ukraine to win this war.
Increase interoperability of our forces
Harness the full potential of combined joint expedititionery forcez
Promote stability in indo-pacific coordinating carrier deployments
Jointly explore development of complex weapons, like air defence, combat air and long-range weapons
Sunak says UK and France are working together to prevent Putin “weaponising our energy security”.
He said they have agreed “an ambitious new energy partnership” including a new deal on civil nuclear cooperation, working together on low carbon energy.
Sunak announces new detention centre in northern France
Rishi Sunak starts his speech with an acknowledgement the two countries have “faced challenges” but today marks a “new beginning”.
Important progress was made on illegal migration, energy and security, he said.
He said Macron agrees that “criminal gangs should not get to decide who comes to our countries”. He said the pair have taken cooperation to an “unprecedented level”.
This includes:
A new detention centre in northern France
A new command centre with enforcement teams together in one place for the first time
An extra 500 new officers patrolling French beaches
More drones and surveillance technologies
Updated
On illegal immigration, Macron said he wanted to make “progress in lockstep”, and stressed France is aware of the sensitivities involved.
He said this year over 30,000 small boat crossings were prevented, and Franco-British intelligence dismantled 55 networks of organised crime.
Macron said they had agreed on a renewed bilateral framework:
Today we decided to continue in that direction, very concretely and conscious of the shared nature of our responsibility.
This includes new initiatives to act together, as well as to collaborate with the Europeans concerned by the transit and crossings and with some countries where trafficking begins.
Macron added that the discussions today included cooperation on energy, including cross-investments on renewable energy.
There were also discussions about curbing the use of fossil fuels and strengthening biodiversity, he said.
Updated
Macron confirms he has agreed with Sunak concrete action on training of the Ukrainian military and on high value segments.
The Russia-Ukraine war forms an important backdrop to the discussions and increases the need to bolster ties on security and defence, he added.
We’ll have to find an outcome to this conflict, we must place our Ukrainian friends in the best possible situation.
He adds the UK and France will work on the inter-operability of future systems including mastery of the seabed and energy-directed weapons, building human and technical capacity and an ambition to work together on on future cruise missiles.
We wish to build the terms of tomorrow’s European security, to have a genuine legal framework for antimissile protection.
Updated
The summit marks a “shared will” to work together, Macron says.
I believe the will you clearly expressed and we discussed jointly together and what our governments have worked on and what we managed to create goes in that direction, he says.
He congratulates Sunak for the Windsor framework and a “new beginning of working more closely with the EU”.
Updated
Macron cycles through some of the most dramatic events to arise in the past five years; including Brexit and the Covid pandemic. But he says the UK and France are bound by geography and no political decision, global health emergency or anything else could change that.
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Macron-Sunak news conference begins
Macron and Sunak are beginning their press conference now, with the French president opening proceedings.
Updated
The UK prime minister and the French president are due to hold a joint press conference at the Élyseé Palace at around 2pm GMT, following their talks. We’ll bring you the live video here, as well as following both the event and the reaction.
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The UK would be required to engage with the EU to resolve any issues about proposed new EU laws being introduced in Northern Ireland, the Irish premier, Leo Varadkar, has said.
Speaking to reporters in Dublin, Varadkar was asked about the so-called Stormont brake; the mechanism by which a minority of MLAs at Stormont can formally raise concerns with the UK government about new EU rules applying to the region.
Varadkar was asked about the UK’s Northern Ireland secretary Chris Heaton-Harris’s admission in Belfast on Thursday that, if the brake were activated, the UK would be “bound” to block the new law in question. Some Stormont parties have expressed concern this indicates the brake will end up handing a powerful veto to a minority of MLAs.
I think what we’re going to have to see is the legislation that the British government introduces, and they’ve committed to consulting with the five main parties in Northern Ireland on that and also the Irish government.
We see the Stormont brake as a red flag mechanism. A mechanism by which 30 assembly members from two parties or more can raise an issue; an issue that we will then try to sort out between the EU and UK and that if things can’t be resolved we then go to international binding arbitrations. That’s how we would see it develop – that’s certainly how it’s written down in the legal text that was agreed between the EU and the UK.
But, of course, the UK can bring in its own internal legislation. But they have committed to consulting with the parties on that.
Updated
Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron spoke for an hour and took the decision to meet on a one-to-one basis, Downing Street has said.
It is understood the prime minister and the French president changed the original plans to ensure they could speak for longer in private. A No 10 spokesperson told reporters in Paris:
The prime minister and President Macron spoke for more than an hour one-to-one.
They were joined at the end by their respective chiefs of staff for a brief period.
It was a warm and productive meeting. They discussed the upcoming Six Nations match, having exchanged signed shirts.
They both agreed on the need for further collaboration on a range of issues, including on defence, energy security and illegal migration.
Updated
Sunak affirms support for negotiated end to Ukraine war
The war in Ukraine will end at the negotiating table, Rishi Sunak has said, as he vowed to support Volodymyr Zelenskiy to be in the “best possible place to have those talks”, the Guardian’s political correspondent Aletha Adu writes.
While the prime minister indicated that now is not the time for those peace talks, he recommitted to providing additional support to Ukraine to ensure they have an advantage on the battlefield.
Sunak’s comments on his way to the first UK-France summit in five years, marked a clear divide in stance on how the war against Russia will end from that of his predecessor Boris Johnson. The former prime minister heaped pressure on Sunak, urging the UK to send jets and tanks to help Ukraine “finish the job”.
Speaking on the Eurostar to Paris hours before meeting his “friend” Emmanuel Macron, Sunak said:
We’re providing training to use those capabilities. That’s all under way, as well as just helping defend themselves against the attacks that they’re facing, particularly on their critical national infrastructure. Now, that should be everyone’s focus.
Of course, this will end as all conflicts do at negotiating table, but that is a decision for Ukraine to make. And what we need to do is put them in the best possible place to have those talks at an appropriate moment that makes sense for them.
But at the moment, the priority has got to be giving them the resources the training and the support they need to push forward and create advantage on the battlefield.
The prime minister hopes to start a “new chapter” in his relationship with France, and believes the nations’ shared outlook on restoring peace in Ukraine will deepen and strengthen that relationship.
The full story is here:
Sunak warns China to stay out of Ukraine-Russia conflict
Security in Europe is “intertwined” with peace in the Indo-Pacific, the Prime Minister has said, as he warned China to stay out of the Ukraine-Russia conflict.
PA reports:
During the UK-France summit in Paris, Rishi Sunak and French President Emmanuel Macron are expected to unveil a plan for increased allied activity in the Indo-Pacific.
No 10 said it will include establishing France and the UK as the “backbone” to a permanent European maritime presence there.
The approach will include co-ordinating regular deployment of France’s Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier and the UK’s HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales carriers across the region.
Sunak, speaking to reporters on board the Eurostar to the summit, said Paris and London were aligned when it came to their approach to the Indo-Pacific, with both declaring they want to be “active participants in the region”.
It comes after the UK in 2021 announced a foreign and defence policy “tilt” towards the Indo-Pacific in the government’s integrated review.
The Prime Minister said the UK and France were focused on the region “for the same reason”, adding: “The security is intertwined.”
He continued:
What we’re going to agree today is a really positive step forward, about the joint operations between our armed forces, (about) how we deploy our carrier groups, and how our navies work together.
And we want to broaden that out over time.
We are two European nations that do genuinely project force and influence and are engaged around the world.
So it’s right that we’re collaborating closely and this today, hopefully (what) we will agree later, will be a more significant step forward than we’ve had in the past in that particular region.
An update to the integrated review is set to be announced by Sunak on Monday during a visit to the US, with new wording reportedly expected on Britain’s approach to Beijing.
Sunak confirmed he and Macron wanted to stress to China and other countries “not to be providing support to Russia” following its invasion of Ukraine.
The Prime Minister said he would be discussing the West’s approach to Beijing ahead of the French president’s visit to China, a trip he said was due to happen soon.
He added:
One thing that we’ve talked about previously in our G7 meetings as well, is a) about our collective economic security, but also ensuring that, as we support Ukraine, part of that is making sure that other countries – we’d urge all countries not to be providing support to Russia, or trying to circumvent sanctions.
Updated
Downing Street has said that Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron’s joint press conference to discuss the outcome of their talks at the Élysée Palace in Paris will be held around 2pm.
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Jeremy Hunt is reportedly planning to give middle-class professionals a pensions boost in next week’s budget to encourage them to continue working, the Guardian’s consumer affairs reporter Jess Clark reports.
The chancellor will announce significant increases to pensions allowances in a bid to tackle the “pension trap”, which has seen many workers take an early retirement, according to the Daily Mail.
The lifetime allowance (LTA) on tax-free pension savings will rise, as well as the £40,000 cap on annual pension contributions, the Daily Mail reported, citing Whitehall sources. The Treasury declined to comment.
The reported increase, which could be revealed in the budget on 15 March, is intended to end the pension trap that can leave some professionals – such as doctors – facing higher tax charges if they stay in the workforce.
Full story here:
Updated
Sunak defends 'sensible' payments for French coastline patrols
Rishi Sunak is “throwing everything” at resolving the problem of small boats of migrants crossing the Channel, and defended payments to France as “sensible investments for the UK”.
PA reports:
Speaking to reporters on the Eurostar to France this morning, Sunak said the UK government was ready to “pull all the levers at our disposal” to stem the flow of boats.
Briefings from France have suggested a multi-year financing deal is on the table which could see Britain agree to pay millions of pounds to Paris in exchange for increased coastline patrols.
But the prime minister, who has made stopping the boats one of his top five priorities ahead of the next election, defended the cost of potentially handing more money to Paris to crack down on the problem.
He said:
If you look at the track record in the last couple of years more recently, not only are we able to intercept thousands of boats just this year, actually, which is positive, the joint work has led to something like a few hundred different arrests, disrupted something like 50 different organised crime gangs.
That’s the outcome of all that joint work, so those are sensible investments for the UK.
I think everyone knows that we are spending £5.5m a day plus on hotels.
We would rather not do that, and the best way to stop that is to stop people coming in the first place.
I think it is wrong to characterise it as ‘we are paying someone else to do something else’.
This is a shared and joint endeavour to reduce illegal migration more generally, and it’s not just a challenge that the French and ourselves face, it’s a broader European challenge.
If we are investing money we want to make sure that that is going on things that we think will make a difference.
So you would always expect me to do that, and that’s why we would not invest any money alongside the French in a joint endeavour unless we thought it was going to go on things that will make a difference.
Asked why Britain was potentially about to agree to pay more only four months after a £63m deal was sealed, Sunak said:
It is not about ‘that didn’t work’. That was just the first step on a journey. And actually, that was great, we got that done so quickly … hopefully we can build on it today and hopefully over time even more to come.
The prime minister said there was no “silver bullet” for fixing the Channel issue but added that the illegal migration bill announced this week, French co-operation and a deal on returning Albanian economic migrants were part of an overall clampdown.
Sunak was set to discuss with Macron the possibility of an EU-UK returns deal, meaning those arriving from Europe without the right to remain in Britain could be immediately returned to their country of origin. It would also involve the UK taking Britons back who do the same in the EU.
The Conservative party leader argued that the Windsor agreement, a pact with the EU designed to fix issues with the Northern Ireland protocol, could pave the way to an accord with Brussels on a returns deal.
He said he hoped the framework “opens up other areas of constructive engagement” with the EU and that a returns deal is “one of the things that I want to talk to them about”.
During Liz Truss’s brief time as prime minister, she said the “jury is out” on whether Macron was Britain’s friend.
Asked on the train whether Macron was a “friend or foe”, Sunak replied:
I said at the time I thought France was not just a friend but a close friend of the UK, and I stand by that.
I can’t figure out the past, all I can do is look forward, and my view is that having a strong collaborative relationship with the French with President Macron is a good thing for the country.
Updated
The UK government should reverse “damaging” plans to tackle illegal migration, a senior member of the Scottish Cabinet has warned, adding that SNP ministers are exploring whether the legislation requires Holyrood’s consent, which they would not give.
PA reports:
Scottish constitution secretary Angus Robertson said SNP ministers were currently “reflecting seriously” on the plans to tackle refugees crossing the English Channel in small boats, to see if Holyrood would be required to give its consent to the legislation.
Robertson made it clear that the Scottish government would not back the Illegal Migration Bill.
In a letter to UK immigration minister Robert Jenrick, he said:
The Scottish government does not support the Bill for a variety of reasons and urges you to reverse your plans and not progress this damaging Bill.
He said the draft legislation outlined earlier this week “deepens already significant damage to the UK’s reputation as a place of refuge and our credibility with international partners”.
But he also indicated the Bill may impede on devolved areas of policy and may therefore require consent from the Scottish Government.
He told Jenrick: “We suspect yet again that some of the measures in this Bill might encroach on already devolved powers and competence – if so, this would be unacceptable.”
PA has some background to the discussions today:
Rishi Sunak has set preventing the small boats from crossing the strait between England and France as one of his top five priorities ahead of the next election.
They are expected to build on a deal announced in November, with the UK agreeing in the autumn to provide £63 million to Paris in a bid to clampdown on trafficking gangs.
Under the commitment, the number of French officers patrolling beaches on the country’s northern coastline rose from 200 to 300, while British officers for the first time were also permitted to be stationed in French control rooms and on the approaches to beaches to observe operations.
Despite the measures, nearly 3,000 people have arrived via small boats in the UK already this year, with almost 46,000 arriving in 2022.
It was reported by the Daily Express that Sunak is ready to give the green light to a deal that would secure a multi-year migration agreement with Paris, which would include Britain paying millions of pounds to France every year to increase the number of patrol officers on French beaches.
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly appeared to confirm that any fresh pact would involve more UK investment. Speaking from Paris, he told BBC Breakfast:
It will cost money, it has cost money and of course we will be negotiating how we fund that joint work to prevent those migration attempts across the Channel.
I’m not going to speculate as to the outcomes of the negotiation but we have been spending money doing this, it’s right and proper that we do and of course we will be spending money in the future.
No 10 has remained tight-lipped on the prospect of a deal being given the green light at the summit but has said the Prime Minister will be calling on his counterpart to “go further” on measures to stop the boats.
The talks between the leaders comes days after Sunak and Home Secretary Suella Braverman, who is also meeting with her counterpart in the French capital on Friday, unveiled the Illegal Migration Bill.
The legislation announced on Tuesday would see migrants who arrive through unauthorised means deported and hit with a lifetime ban from returning.
It is thought Macron is likely to want to hear from the Prime Minister about how the bill will make Britain a less attractive destination for migrants.
As Sunak and Macron are talking, including about a multi-year funding settlement to help pay for policing efforts in northern France, Sky News’ Sam Coates has tweeted documents showing that the UK has spent over £300m in payments to France aimed at stopping small boat crossings since 2014.
Arriving at the Elysee and Sunak and Macron prepare to talk small boats, VERY worth reading this Commons refresher on multiple cash injections to France so far….
— Sam Coates Sky (@SamCoatesSky) March 10, 2023
More than £300m in UK to Fr payments since 2014https://t.co/npqqSRUmpf pic.twitter.com/frcEzOUMDK
France and the UK are “close neighbours”, “great friends” and “historic allies”, prime minister Rishi Sunak has tweeted.
Posting a photo of a warm handshake with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, he added: “It’s great to be in Paris.”
Close neighbours. Great friends. Historic allies. 🇬🇧🇫🇷
— Rishi Sunak (@RishiSunak) March 10, 2023
It's great to be in Paris @EmmanuelMacron. pic.twitter.com/s7eRLY80Zk
Updated
The Guardian’s France correspondent Angelique Chrisafis is in Paris today, reporting from the summit:
Rishi Sunak arrived at the Elysée Palace in a Range Rover with a British flag flying. Emmanuel Macron greeted him warmly with several rounds of handshakes and back-patting before they went into their first lengthy working meeting.
The two leaders – both former investment bankers, sons of doctors, and of similar age – have billed this first meeting as a chance to deepen their working relationship and personally “reset” and repair the troubled cross-Channel relationship.
Franco-British relations had in recent years plummeted to their worst state in decades, dominated by bitter rows over submarine contracts, post-Brexit fishing rights and who was to blame for the catastrophic deaths of people trying to reach the UK coast on small boats.
Sunak’s main message, as stressed in an interview with the French daily Le Figaro this morning, was that Macron is a “great friend” and France is an ally and close partner. Sunak said he wanted to write “a new chapter in the relationship”, that he personally had very warm feelings for France, having worked with French bosses in the banking sector. France was his favourite holiday destination, he said.
High on the agenda for this morning’s discussions is joint support for Ukraine and further defence cooperation between the UK and France, with an announcement expected this afternoon on closer British and French support for Ukraine.
The issue of migration and small boats crossing the Channel is a high priority for the UK. But the talks in Paris will focus on one specific area: reinforcing the existing close cooperation between France and the UK in securing and policing the northern French coast to prevent small boats from crossing.
Friday’s summit will not discuss any issue of returning migrants to France. This is an EU matter and must be handled at EU level by Sunak, in UK-EU talks, not on a bilateral basis with France.
Updated
Rishi Sunak has now arrived at the Élysée Palace in Paris, where he is meeting with Emmanuel Macron today.
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As Emmanuel Macron prepares to welcomes Rishi Sunak to Paris’s Franco-British summit on Friday, the Élysée sees it as a “turning of the page” – the end of a nightmare chapter in cross-Channel relations, writes the Guardian’s France correspondent, Angelique Chrisafis.
The mood between France and the UK had in recent years plummeted to its worst state in decades with bitter rows over submarine contracts, fishing rights and who was to blame for the catastrophic deaths of people trying to reach the UK coast on small boats.
The fact that a Franco-British summit is taking place at all is seen as a kind of victory in Paris. “Our priority is to reconnect and get back into the habit of working together,” an Elysée official said.
The full analysis is here:
A hug between Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron is on the front cover of France’s left-leaning Libération daily newspaper this morning.
The headline reads: “Nice to see you again.”
The embracing pair are pictured on a chintzy mug, encircled by a heart.
The strap line reads:
After several years of turbulence linked to Brexit, Paris and London are attempting to renew relations this Friday with a bilateral summit, the first in five years.
A la une de @Libe ce vendredi :
— Libération (@libe) March 9, 2023
Sommet Franco-britannique : contents de vous revoir
Lire : https://t.co/nj2k4mQp7h #Brexit pic.twitter.com/hHs8YaJQeL
In the article previewing the meeting, Libération takes the meeting as a sign of a “serious relaunch” of “renewed and constructive” relations after “seven years in which they steadily grew colder”. The newspaper views King Charles’s first official overseas visit as “the icing on the cake”.
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Refugees have said detaining asylum seekers will “traumatise” and not deter them, describing the government’s illegal migration bill as “cruel and abhorrent”.
The statement shared by the Refugee Council comes before a summit between Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron, which will discuss the UK’s controversial proposals to curb Channel crossings by removing asylum seekers from the UK and banning them for life.
Farzad, who did not wish to share his second name, arrived in the UK by boat in 2019 after fleeing Iran due to persecution he faced for religious reasons and said he did not think the bill would act as a deterrent.
He said:
[Detaining asylum seekers] will traumatise them more and make them more vulnerable. When people are running, they are more concerned with what they are running from, not what they are running to.
They don’t sit down and calculate … they are mostly worried about their life in their home country, and that’s why they are basically leaving their lives and coming here.
I decided to go to the UK, because I speak English … they put me in a lorry, and then in a van.
After this long journey, they forced me and a few other people into a boat – this was not what they had promised me to do, I was not supposed to come by boat … it was dark, it was foggy, it was cold.
I claimed asylum on the spot (and) after a year I was granted asylum.
Had I been treated differently, I’m not sure life would turn out the way it is now for me.
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Good morning.
Fridays are often quiet in Westminster but today a major event is taking place: the first UK-France summit in five years. Rishi Sunak is set to meet the French president, Emmanuel Macron, to discuss Channel small boat crossings.
Sunak will be looking to strengthen policing of the Channel coast and reach a deal on returning people who arrive from France, although officials expect Macron will defer this to a wider EU-wide returns deal.
Macron in turn wants the UK to agree to a multi-year funding settlement to help pay for policing efforts in northern France to prevent crossings. The Times reported that the UK could offer up to £200m over three years to stop crossings “at source”.
Small boats are a priority for Sunak, who has invested considerable political capital in the controversial new immigration bill that will criminalise anyone who arrives unofficially, with the threat of rapid deportation and a permanent ban from settling in the UK.
Wider bilateral issues such as defence and Ukraine are also on the agenda, with concrete announcements including an agreement to develop precision strike weapons to combat Russian aggression expected.
Here’s the agenda for the day:
10am: Bilateral talks between Sunak and Macron at the Élysée Palace.
11am: Sunak and Macron to meet UK and French business leaders.
2pm: Joint press conference with live video planned.
A joint statement is also expected at the end of the day.
Suella Braverman, the home secretary, James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, and the energy secretary, Grant Shapps, will all meet their French counterparts.
There will also be a focus on rebuilding more cordial relations following tensions over Brexit and the more abrasive approaches of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
The Guardian’s diplomatic correspondent, Patrick Wintour, writes that the summit is “not just important bilaterally, but also in terms of Britain’s relationship with the EU”.
We’ll be keeping you updated with the latest from the summit, where our political correspondent Aletha Adu and France correspondent Angelique Chrisafis are reporting.
Separately, the Labour leader, Keir Starmer, is visiting Scotland today, where he is expected to “pledge to put Scottish innovation at the ‘heart’ of plans to boost the economy”. Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrat leader, Ed Davey, is calling for a cut to energy bills and a plan to insulate homes, before the party’s Scottish conference.
Thanks for following us today, as always you can drop me a line with anything we’ve missed.
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