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Sir Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron are in the final stages of agreeing a reciprocal migrants return deal to be announced at the end of the French President’s state visit on Thursday.
Senior British officials said details and wording of the agreement were still being hashed out, including during late-night talks on Wednesday, but that both sides were moving towards a final agreement.
The FT first reported in March that discussions were taking place between France and the UK over a “one in, one out” pilot scheme, with the hopes that the initiative could be expanded into a broader EU programme.
The deal is expected to include up to 50 migrants a week being sent from the UK to France, with an equivalent number sent in return if they have a legitimate right to be in Britain, according to people briefed on the discussions.
This would equate to around 1 in 17 migrants that are currently coming to Britain on small boats.
France has been willing to test such a scheme, despite its long-standing preference for an EU-wide arrangement, because it believes a returns agreement would deter human traffickers and migrants.
Negotiations over the deal have been complicated by pushback from other EU nations, and wrangling over exactly which migrants would be included in the agreement.
Italy, Spain, Greece, Malta and Cyprus sent a letter to the European Commission last month objecting to a French-British deal on the grounds it might lead more migrants to settle in the EU countries where they first land.
Emanuele Loperfido, an MP in the ruling Brothers of Italy party in Giorgia Meloni’s administration, told the BBC on Wednesday that he was concerned the deal would push more migrants to the south of Europe.
Macron and Starmer will have bilateral talks on Thursday morning, and will hold a joint press conference in the afternoon where details of the deal are expected to be outlined.
In a public address on Wednesday afternoon, Macron said both nations would seek to tackle irregular migration with “humanity, solidarity and fairness”, but also made a pointed reference to “addressing migration pull factors” in the UK — a long-standing argument made by French officials.
More than 21,000 irregular migrants have crossed the channel to the UK on small boats so far this year, marking a record for the first six months of the year, according to official data.
Madeleine Sumption, director of Oxford university’s Migration Observatory, said on Thursday that the extent of the scheme’s deterrent effect would be determined by the number of people sent back across the channel.
“If it was a majority of people being sent back to France, it would be more likely that people would know about it and would believe that this is something that could happen to them,” she told the BBC.
Sumption pointed out that “a lot of the reasons people come here are not easy to change in policy”, including the fact that they already have family members here and that they speak only English.
The bitter domestic politics over small boats crossings have been illustrated in grim fashion this week as an effigy of a boat carrying migrants was placed at the top of a bonfire in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.
The model showed figures wearing orange life jackets atop the bonfire in Moygashel with signs below reading “Stop the boats”, “Veterans before refugees” and “Stop illegal immigration”. The pyre was due to be set alight on Thursday as part of Northern Ireland’s annual bonfire season, where towers of wooden pallets are burned during unionist celebrations.
“This disturbing display is a vile, dehumanising act that fuels hatred and racism,” said Patrick Corrigan, Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland director. Politicians from all sides in the region echoed the condemnation.
