Helen Whately has taken aim at Labour’s illegal migration strategy following a terrifying incident involving GB News star Patrick Christys.
Speaking to GB News, the Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary hit out at the Government’s unwillingness to leave the ECHR, declaring we need “tougher” measures to prevent Channel crossings.
In a special GB News report, Patrick Christys was attacked by migrants in a camp in Calais, resulting in his GB News crew being forced to flee the scene.
Several members of the team were injured, one requiring immediate medical attention, and cars were damaged in the terrifying confrontation.
Reacting to the footage, Ms Whately told the People’s Channel that what happened to Patrick and his crew is “shocking” and “horrible”.
She said: “I’ve been watching that footage just then, and it’s really shocking and horrible for the team there. Who wants to have that group of people coming over to the UK? I certainly don’t want to.”
Pressed by host Alex Armstrong on how the Conservatives would tackle the issue, Ms Whately argued that coming to the UK is currently “too attractive” for asylum seekers and people smugglers.
She told GB News: “Clearly we want to see those boats stopping their journeys to the UK. What’s the best way of doing that?
“While it’s attractive for people to come to the UK, they will find whatever means they can. At the moment its boats, before it was hiding away in lorries.
“Well, we have to make the UK not a place that you can stay if you come here illegally, and to me that’s the absolute crucial thing. It’s a deterrent effect. When anybody lands in the UK illegally, they’re being detained.”
Making clear the Tory strategy, she stressed: “And our policy is they should be deported within a week so that you cannot stay here in the UK. We know that to do that we’d have to leave the ECHR, that’s Conservative policy that we would leave that.
“So we wouldn’t get all the lawfare and all those law cases that try and keep people here in the UK and stop them being deported. That’s what we need, a really tough system so people know if they come here illegally, they cannot stay.”
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Asked for her verdict on the situation in Piddington ahead of their independence referendum today, Ms Whately expressed concern for the villagers and their pleas being “ignored” by the Government.
Ms Whately said: “People want to be heard. Our Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Philp, was there in Piddington yesterday, talking to people, listening to the views there as well, and we understand the anger.
“People are so furious, they just feel nobody’s listening to them. And you can understand a small village not wanting to have hundreds of asylum seekers, all male, located there.
“They’re also free to roam and move about. Of course, you can understand that people don’t want that to happen. They don’t want that to happen in their local community, and they’re doing whatever they can to be heard.”
A Home Office spokesman has said of the migrant crisis: “This Government is bearing down on dangerous small boat crossings and restoring control at our border.
“Joint efforts have seen over 48,000 crossing attempts prevented and 1,100 boats and engines seized since the election.
“We are making progress, with the number of small boat crossings down this year and the lowest number recorded for the month of July since 2020.
“But we must go further, which is why we have signed a payment-by-results deal with the French to put 40 per cent more boots on the ground on French beaches.”
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