The UK government is desperate to show it is preventing small boat crossings, but its PR-heavy approach may cause more problems with voters than it solves
At 5.30am on Tuesday, six immigration enforcement officers and a BBC TV crew gathered in a deserted B&Q car park near Sheffield’s railway station, waiting in the rain for a call from London that would trigger simultaneous arrests of suspected people smugglers in six towns.
Forty minutes later, the Home Office staff drove in convoy to a nearby residential block (followed by the BBC and the Guardian), made their way up the stairs carrying a red battering ram, ready to smash the suspect’s door down. The equipment wasn’t needed, because the man, barefoot in his checked pyjamas, opened the door and let the team inside. He was given a few moments to get dressed, before being taken silently in handcuffs to the van outside, sweat running down his face.
Footage of the wider operation was broadcast that night on the BBC and also ITV News at 10, with the security minister, Dan Jarvis, in Cheltenham, wearing a black immigration enforcement stab vest, observing another of the six linked arrests.
Keir Starmer posted photographs of the raids on X, tersely announcing: “When I said we would smash the people smuggling gangs, I meant it.”
