David Blunkett Told Tony Blair UK was Considered ‘Easy Touch’ by Traffickers

National Archives has released Cabinet Office files from 2002

Britain's former Prime Minister Tony Blair attends an event at Thomson Reuters in London on Oct. 11, 2018. (Reuters/Simon Dawson/File Photo)

Britain was considered an “easy touch” by people traffickers and the facilitators of illegal immigration in 2002, according to classified government files which have just been released.

In January 2002 the then home secretary, David Blunkett, wrote to Prime Minister Tony Blair about discussions with the French government about the closure of the Sangatte refugee camp, near Calais.

Sangatte had been opened by the Red Cross in 1999 to cater for migrants who were trying to get across the English Channel from France to England and by 2001 it had become a magnet for illegal immigrants from Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo.

In November 2001, Mr. Blair met the French prime minister, Lionel Jospin, and urged him to close the Sangatte camp.

Mr. Jospin refused and instead suggested the British begin processing asylum claims at Sangatte, rather than after the illegal immigrants arrived in England, often hidden inside lorries which travelled through the Channel Tunnel at Coquelles.

In a confidential memo—released on Wednesday by the National Archives—Mr. Blunkett told Mr. Blair one of the problems with Mr. Jospin’s suggestion was the majority of the migrants at Sangatte, did not easily fit into the category of having “manifestly unfounded” claims for asylum.

Blunkett Feared UK Would Receive 2,000 Migrants at Sangatte

Mr. Blunkett said of Mr. Jospin’s proposals: “Under these arrangements, the UK could expect to receive the majority of the almost 2,000 current residents of Sangatte pretty well immediately.”

The home secretary said Mr. Jospin’s plan would do nothing to deter the 800 immigrants who were arriving in northern France every month.

Mr. Blunkett’s memo went on: “On the contrary, they could positively support the facilitators’ and traffickers’ message that the UK is an ‘easy touch.’”

Thousands of refugees had fled Afghanistan during the rule of the Taliban and even though they had been ousted from Kabul in November 2001, Afghans continued to leave the country and many tried to reach relatives in Britain.

In the memo, Mr. Blunkett told Mr. Blair: “French powers of detention only allow for detention for 14 days and do not allow detention at all for those claiming asylum because of alleged persecution by non-state agents. Since Afghanistan is not a state for these purposes, the problem of the Afghans would remain.”

A few days later Mr. Blair wrote to Mr. Jospin—a Socialist, who was serving under the conservative President Jacques Chirac—saying, “we would need some changes for the proposals to be acceptable.”

Mr. Blair told Mr. Jospin: “As you know, my key concern is to ensure the arrangements do not attract more immigrants to northern France and the UK and that they should involve early closure of the centre (at Sangatte).”

Blair Warned French of ‘Pull Factor’

He added: “I do not believe it is in either of our interests to let Sangatte residents proceed directly to the UK after only an initial screening at Coquelles. To do so would support the criminal activities of facilitators and traffickers and act as a major pull factor.”

Mr. Blair suggested if Britain was to process asylum applications in France, it should be at sites well away from the coast, and not at Sangatte.

“We should also need well-planned, highly publicised returns of failed applicants,” he added.

Mr. Blair then urged Mr. Jospin to take more action to keep illegal immigrants away from the freight yard at Fréthun, where freight trains waited before passing through the Channel Tunnel.

He said: “Since November, inadequate security at the Fréthun rail freight yard has allowed assaults by illegal immigrants to more than half the rail freight going through the Channel Tunnel.”

Mr. Blair told Mr. Jospin an “increased police presence” at Fréthun was “urgently needed.”

Mr. Jospin would go on to become the Socialist candidate at the French presidential election in April 2002 but he fared badly, losing in the first round.

Sangatte Eventually Shut by Sarkozy

Mr. Chirac would go on to beat the Front National’s Jean-Marie Le Pen—whose campaign was heavily anti-immigration—and the re-elected president appointed Nicolas Sarkozy as interior minister, and in December 2002 Mr. Sarkozy closed Sangatte.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy (L) and Prime Minister David Cameron exchange copies after signing a treaty during the Anglo-French summit at Lancaster House on Nov. 2, 2010 in London, England. (Lionel Bonaventure/Getty Images)

Mr. Blunkett would describe the closure of Sangatte as a “breakthrough of enormous proportions” but it did not deter migrants for long and by 2007 there were 1,500 migrants living in squalid conditions near the former refugee camp.

Mr. Sarkozy was elected President of France in April 2007 and a month later said, “There will be no new Sangatte while I am president.”

But the migrants remained and, during the migration crisis of 2015, the number at the so-called Calais Jungle swelled to more than 8,000 before it was demolished in October 2016.

People trafficking continues to this day but instead of camping by the coast, the illegal immigrants tend to be transported from elsewhere in Europe to the coast at the last minute and then taken by small boats across the English Channel.