𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

A people-smuggler whose network brings hundreds of illegal migrants into the UK told the Sunday Express at the weekend that demand for Britain’s generous benefits generates too much money to stop. In the exclusive report, the Afghan crime lord sensationally claimed his gang – which operates from Turkey to the UK – is even tipped off by contacts within the state apparatus to help avoid detection. Asked if the threats of a crackdown by the National Crime Agency would put him off, the smuggler told the paper: “Demand is too high. There are a lot of people that are asking us to go to Europe. When demand is high, of course we will take the risk.”

Frankly, it’s no surprise profits are high enough to enable alleged corruption within our own border security. With 15 years’ experience of trafficking, the gang boss spoke with an incisiveness that eludes most Home Office ministers. “I’m not an educated person,” he admitted, while explaining that the pull factor for illegal migrants is the “very good hospitality from the UK, including hotels, and their families are encouraging them”. And if business is booming now, it’s only going to get better.

“The demand is increasing,” he said. “People are leaving their countries. They would like to go to safer countries. This is our business.”

And if the UK continues to give illegal migrants free accommodation and generous benefits, it’s just making this criminal business all the more attractive.

With the risk of arrest outweighed by the prospect of vast profits, it can only be ended by one action – the deportation of tens of thousands of illegal migrants which would kill the business overnight. That is the only thing the smugglers fear, but they know it’s something no British politician has thus far been able to deliver.

Neither the Tories nor Labour have possessed the courage to enforce mass deportations. Briefly, the Rwanda scheme sent shivers through refugee camps, but Rishi Sunak failed to deport a single migrant to Africa before losing the general election in 2024. Was this because he knew that his left-leaning civil service would have undermined the process before it even got going?

Again and again, we have been unable to eject foreign criminals from our own shores. Latest Home Office figures reveal that nearly 20,000 foreign criminals are avoiding deportation, many living freely in our communities despite having been convicted of sex crimes, violence and theft. Frequently they use the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) to frustrate deportation, but government after government has been afraid to junk the out-of-date legislation.

It has now been estimated that asylum seekers exploiting the ECHR to stay in Britain will cost taxpayers some £4.9billion over their lifetimes. It’s little wonder foreign criminals laugh at our failure to secure our borders and exploit the huge demand for arriving here.

We make it so easy for them and there is now a strong suspicion that pro-migration activists are working within our government for political reasons to swamp our shores.

These are the same people who battle against patriots hanging up the national flag in their streets. Blatantly pro-open border Green councillors in Bristol want to stop locals waving the flag despite having been happy to fly the Palestinian tricolour over their council offices last year. They are less keen on the flag of St George because they claim it is not “welcoming”.

From the words of people-smuggling Afghan crime lords, Britain is already “welcoming” enough. By allowing criminal networks to thrive, our government is enabling corruption to spread not only just at our borders, but also onto our high streets where criminal gangs have already taken over shops and restaurants to sell illegal goods and promote their trafficking businesses. This criminal enterprise is already so enormous and entrenched it looks set to defy the attempts of any weak-willed politicians to do anything about it.

Until a political party grabs this issue by the neck and starts deporting illegal migrants by the thousand, we’ll be doomed to an ineffectual parade of briefly-appointed Prime Ministers who talk the talk but do not walk the walk.

If Britain is to survive as a prosperous nation that treats all citizens fairly, it needs to bring a swift end to the organised crime exploiting our overly generous welcome to the rest of the world. We cannot keep wasting billions of pounds on a system that rewards ruthless gangsters in far flung corners of the globe.