Immigration minister Robert Jenrick has rejected language used by the home secretary describing the increase of asylum seekers to the UK as an “invasion”.
Suella Braverman told MPs yesterday that the public needs to know which party is serious about “stopping the invasion” of migrants on the southern coast of the UK.
Mr Jenrick, when asked if he would characterise the situation in the same way, told Sky News: “In a job like mine, you have to choose your words very carefully. And I would never demonise people coming to this country in pursuit of a better life.”
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However, he said describing people crossing the Channel as an “invasion” was a way to show the scale of the challenge “and that’s what Suella Braverman was trying to express”.
He said fifty thousand people have arrived in the UK on small boats this year and that number is likely to increase.
He also claimed that Ms Braverman was speaking for people who live on the south coast “who day in, day out are seeing migrant boats landing on their beaches”.
“There was a report just yesterday from a lady who found a young migrant from Albania in her kitchen seeking support, asking for money,” he said.
“I know that that’s not acceptable in this country.”
However, Labour said that Ms Braverman’s language has put communities, the police and security services at risk – pointing to the weekend’s petrol bomb attack on the Border Force immigration centre in Dover.
Shadow culture secretary Lucy Powell told Sky News: “For the home secretary to put our security services at a greater strain through incendiary language is deeply irresponsible.”
Ms Braverman made the comments as she gave a statement to the House of Commons about overcrowding at the Manston immigration processing centre in Kent, where outbreaks of MRSA and diptheria have been reported.
The site is operating at double capacity, with more people there than in any UK prison and many being detained for longer than the 24 hours intended.
‘More hotels being procured at pace’
Mr Jenrick revealed the government is procuring more hotels to accommodate asylum seekers waiting for their applications to be processed.
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He accepted “conditions are poor” at Manston, with people sleeping on mats and staying longer than the 24 hours intended.
“This is not a satisfactory situation. I’m not here to defend that,” he said.
However he insisted the root cause is not the government, adding: “The problem is that thousands of people are crossing the Channel illegally every day.”
Mr Jenrick said Manston is “fit for purpose” but “the issue is there are far too many people staying there”.
“We’re procuring more hotels at pace,” he said.
“More hotels have been coming online almost every month throughout the whole of this year. So Suella Braverman and her predecessor, Priti Patel, were procuring more hotels. What I have done in my short tenure is wrap that up and procure even more.”
Home office ‘needs to get a grip’
Ms Braverman has faced criticism for the facility’s overcrowding and has been accused of ignoring legal advice that said migrants should be sent to hotels from Manston.
But on Monday she said she “never ignored legal advice” and since she was appointed by Liz Truss in early September has “worked hard to find accommodation to relieve pressure at Manston”.
However, yhe Home Office has been told to “get a grip” over the issues at Manston, after a new report – based on an inspection in July – revealed detainees were not allowed to close toilet doors fully and had to sleep on the floor.
Some migrants have not been allowed access to mobile phones to inform their families if they were safe, while other “exhausted detainees” have waited more than 30 hours to be processed, the report from HM Inspectorate of Prisons found.
Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, told Sky News he would be “horrified” if he saw the conditions at Manston in prisons.
“As I said before, the Home Office needs to get a grip.”
