Illegal immigration

Friday

Kate Andrews

Can we trust the Tories on immigration? An interview with Chris Philp, shadow home secretary

38 min listen

On this special episode of Coffee House Shots, economics editor Kate Andrews is joined by shadow home secretary Chris Philp to discuss the Tories’ newly announced plan to tackle immigration. On legal migration, their proposal includes plans to end worklessness in order to stop the reliance on low-paid migrant workers. And on illegal migration, the line is ‘zero tolerance’ on small boats, including a removals deterrent much like the Rwanda plan, as well as other changes to the legal framework. One of the more controversial elements of their strategy is on citizenship. The Tories want to increase the period before migrants can apply for indefinite leave to remain (ILR) from five to ten

Monday

Cindy Yu

What’s behind the Chinese migrant surge at the Darien Gap?

23 min listen

The Darien Gap is a 60 mile stretch of jungle that hundreds of thousands of migrants from all over South America trek through in order to reach the US-Mexico border. From there, they enter America in search of better lives. These are usually migrants from Venezuela, or Colombia or Panama. But in recent years, a new group of people have appeared at the border, having paid people smugglers and hacked through the jungle. They often bring young children, clutch on to smartphones with which they check their routes, and watch social media videos that set out, step by step, the journey they are embarking on. These are the Chinese, which

Wednesday

Patrick O’Flynn

Priti Patel is running out of excuses for the Channel migrant crisis

When immigration minister Chris Philp announced last summer that he was in the process of agreeing a ‘new operational plan’ with his French counterparts to stop the cross-Channel traffic in irregular migrants, it seemed as though the government was finally getting a grip on the crisis. In a statement to camera he declared:  ‘We had a very constructive meeting with our French colleagues in Paris this morning. We have reaffirmed our unshakeable shared commitment to making sure this route of crossing the Channel is made unviable…we have worked on a joint operational plan, with the objective in mind of completely cutting this route. We’re going to work at pace in the