Rishi Sunak vows to stop Channel migrant boats but admits there’s no ‘firm date’
RISHI Sunak says he will not stop until he has stopped the boats – but admitted there is no “firm date” for hitting his target.
The PM told MPs deterrents like Rwanda must be given time to work.
Figures show that crossings have fallen by a third after the PM made the pledge at the beginning of the year – but they are still to hit 30,000.
Mr Sunak has been forced to delay a major speech on migration that was due this week.
It was abandoned after a pledge to reduce the asylum backlog was missed, with boats only slightly down and the Bibby Stockholm barge barely half full.
Plans to champion MoD bases being used to house migrants were also canned: because no one has moved out of hotels yet.
Speaking at an end of term grilling by the Liason Committee, Mr Sunak said: “There isn’t a firm date on this because I’ve always been clear from the beginning.
“We will keep going until we do.
“This isn’t one of these things when there’s a precise date estimate on it, this is something where before I took this job they had only ever gone up, now they’re down by a third.”
He said he was “highly confident” that new legislation would help deport asylum seeker but stopped short of confirming any new deals were on the cards saying only that the we “want to have other conversations with other countries”.