Countries who don’t ‘play ball’ to accept migrants from the UK could have visas suspended

The Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced that countries who fail to accept migrants from the UK could have British visas suspended.

Mahmood met with her opposite numbers from the Five Eyes Intelligence alliance to discuss efforts to tackle the smuggling gangs.

She hosted her counterparts from New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the US in London.

Ministers are discussing the possible use of military bases to house asylum seekers in “temporary but adequate” living accommodation.

On Saturday around 1,097 migrants crossed the English Channel on 17 small boats, bringing the total number coming to Britain’s shores 30,100 this year.

Defence minister Luke Pollard told Good Morning Britain, “We’ve deployed a military planning team into Border Security Command and the Home Office to look at military and non-military sites, about where we can help build temporary but adequate accommodation that enables us to transfer those folks from asylum hotels into that temporary accommodation so we can close even more hotels.

“We’ve closed 25 in the last year, but the Prime Minister is clear he wants every single one of them closed.”

He added: “The Ministry of Defence has expertise that no other Government department has and so that’s precisely why we’re using the military planners – those experts that delivered so much of the additional support during Covid, for instance, that respond to emergencies nationwide – we’re using those skilled people to support this effort, and certainly getting on top of this issue is a Government priority.”