One illegal migrant was returned to France on Thursday from the UK in a first for the “one in, one out” agreement to remove people who arrive on small boats.
The man, who originated from India, was removed aboard an Air France flight which went on to land in Paris. He remains the only person to be repatriated under the much-touted scheme agreed in July.
No explanation was given as to why the illegal was not returned directly to India rather than back across the English Channel from where he will be able once again to board a dinghy to return to the UK.
British left-wing Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron agreed a pilot scheme earlier this year that would see Britain deporting to France undocumented people arriving in small boats.
Attempts at fulfilling this have failed multiple times due to legal challenges, as Breitbart News reported.
Reuters reports the latest attempt has been a success with the sole deportee despatched even as Starmer’s government faces mounting pressure to stop small boats taking illegals across the Channel from Europe.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has sternly vowed to fight “vexatious, last-minute claims” after the High Court intervened this week in the case of an Eritrean man who argued, after arrival in the UK by small boat last month, that he was a victim of modern slavery just hours before his flight was due to take off, the BBC notes.
Mahmood said: “Migrants suddenly deciding that they are a modern slave on the eve of their removal, having never made such a claim before, make a mockery of our laws and this country’s generosity.”
Gleeful illegal migrants wait on a dinghy as they prepare to cross the English Channel on August 25, 2025 in Gravelines, France. More than 30,000 migrants have crossed the waterway in small boats already this year. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)
The porous English Channel gateway is a route by which more than 30,000 people have already come so far in 2025 – up 38 percent on the same period last year.
Since figures were first recorded in 2018, more than 180,000 people have crossed illegally paying people smugglers to land in the UK and access free accommodation, food, travel and transport all funded by taxpayers.
Now that number can be reduced by one doubtlessly drawing much applause, cheers and back-slapping from the embattled Starmer government.
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