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March 10, 2023
Press release

Brexit is the root cause behind the alleged increase in migrants crossing the English Channel and the best way to resolve the issue is to re-join the EU, the Rejoin EU Party says.

Ex-footballer and Match of the Day host Gary Lineker has sparked predictable faux “outrage” from Conservative MPs by describing government plans to deal with migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats as “immeasurably cruel” and language employed by ministers as “not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 1930s.”

Regardless of the merits or otherwise of Lineker’s comments, he is perfectly entitled to express them, they have attracted widespread support on social media and the fact remains that the UK has brought these issues upon itself by leaving the EU.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has claimed the number of people entering the UK illegally in small boats has more than quadrupled in the last two years and the reason that criminal gangs organise the trips is because “they know our system can be exploited.”

Well, the Rejoin EU Party has news for Sunak – Brexit is mainly responsible for the supposed increase in numbers and for leaving the system open to exploitation.

Before the UK left the EU, Britain was able to ask fellow member states under an agreement known as the Dublin Convention to take people back if they had passed through safe countries on the way to the UK.

But the UK lost that option when it recklessly left the EU without a replacement returns agreement – and the gangs Sunak refers to know that and are taking advantage of it.
On top of that, Sunak reportedly now plans to blow £470m on tackling an issue that the UK could potentially have largely resolved simply by staying in the EU.

Rejoin EU Party leader Richard Hewison said: “Once again, instead of accepting this as just another predictable consequence of Brexit, the government and Tory MPs are thrashing about trying to cover their tracks.

“It’s just another cynical and costly attempt by ministers to distract from the scandals engulfing the government by scapegoating migrants and blaming Lineker, France, the EU, Remainers etc – in fact, everyone but themselves.”

Rejoin EU Party deputy leader Jim Newell said: “The government’s asylum policy once again shows its contempt for international law and human rights.

“As part of a future in which Britain re-joins the EU, we want to see an acknowledgement that Brexit has made us less tolerant and more xenophobic as a society, that the UK does in fact take far fewer refugees than other big European countries and that openness to inward migration enriches everyone, economically, culturally and socially.”
Rejoin EU Party activist Martin Housden said: “Brexit has made respectable a xenophobia which rendered three million of our continental European friends strangers overnight. Hardly any mainstream politicians raised a finger in their defence,
“Governments worldwide have historically found it useful to divert attention from their failures by blaming those who cannot answer back. A million pressing problems will never be solved by picking on migrants; it may even worsen them.”
Rejoin EU Party deputy chairman and former MEP Brendan Donnelly said: “The new Illegal Migration Bill is unlikely to solve the problem it supposedly addresses, is open to legal challenge and is largely a product of the internal wrangling of the Conservative Party.”
For further discussion of this topic, please see: fedtrust.co.uk/video-brexit-and-small-boats-taking-back-control-of-immigration/
*Notes to editors:*
*The Rejoin EU party is campaigning to re-join the EU because we believe re-joining is the only way to solve the problems Brexit has created. Brexit is broken and it’s breaking our country too. All the promises on which Brexit was sold to the electorate in 2016 were nonsense. Far from reducing red tape and providing £350m a week for the NHS, Brexit makes trading with the crucial European market more complex, difficult and expensive and threatens to reduce funding for public services. If you agree Brexit is making our country poorer, less tolerant and less united, join us and send a message to Westminster that you want your EU membership back, with all its freedoms and benefits.*
*Contact Rejoin EU at admin@therejoineuparty.com <admin@therejoineuparty.com>, visit our website at www.therejoineuparty.com <www.therejoineuparty.com/> and donate at Rejoin EU Party Campaign Fund – www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/rejoin-eu-party-campaign-fund <www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/rejoin-eu-party-campaign-fund>. You can also follow the party on Twitter at @rejoinp*