Watch: Home Secretary flounders over small boats

Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour lot are desperate to get the press and public talking about anything but the Budget this week – and so the issue of Channel crossings is where the Prime Minister is focusing his attention today. Yvette Cooper was quizzed on the airwaves this morning ahead of the PM’s speech to Interpol’s general assembly in Glasgow over Labour’s small boat plans – but the Home Secretary seemed a little uncomfortable on the specifics…

Grilled on BBC Breakfast, Cooper was asked when Labour expects to see a drop in the number of migrants crossing the Channel. ‘We obviously want to make progress as far and as fast as possible,’ the Home Secretary started, adding: ‘We know of course it does take time to get the investigators in place.’ Pushed on exactly how long the process would take, however, Cooper simply refused to say.

What I’m not going to do is what Rishi Sunak did and just set out slogans and say everything was going to be solved in 12 months, all on the basis of a slogan, because I don’t think people will take that seriously anymore.