Labour has admitted that the “one-in, one-out“ deal with France costs £56,000 per migrant, just months after they denied a request from GB News to reveal the information.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has confirmed the cost per migrant to the Home Affairs Committee.
Since the scheme with France was launched last summer, 1,400 migrants have been sent back across the Channel.
Including detention, security and legal costs, on top of the costs of removing each migrant, the grand total in a year has reached £78million.
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The deal sees France accept illegal migrants in return for sending a similar number of asylum seekers who have passed security tests to the UK.
Ms Mahmood said there was evidence of the scheme acting as a deterrent, saying migrants were “not getting on boats because they think there is a chance of being accepted through the one-in, one-out deal.
“I think it is having some effect,” she said while admitting that the numbers in the scheme were “still relatively small”, as it had been a pilot designed to “prove the concept that such a deal is viable that you can get returns off and up and running.
“It’s not been without its challenges. Obviously, the numbers are still relatively small, and what has been more operationally difficult is to scale up very large numbers of removals every week into the French system.
“[It’s] operationally difficult for them as well as for us, and there’s constraints on both sides on things like detention.
“If you’re a failed asylum-seeking family, what you’re trading off is an offer of £40,000, which will help you resettle back in your country of origin, versus access to free healthcare and education for your children.
“We’re trying to assess what people respond to, and you’re trying to assess behavioural changes. I think it’s right to have trialled something different to see if we can break the log-jam on the removals of failed asylum-seeking families.”
The revelation comes after a request by GB News to reveal this information was denied.
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GB News demanded a breakdown of costs for designing, negotiating and implementing the deal, payments made to France, operational costs for detaining and transporting small boat migrants and any legal costs incurred as a result of appeals.
The Freedom of Information request was made in advance of June 11, when the initial cross-Channel pilot scheme was scheduled to end.
The Home Office initially extended the period of The People Channel’s request, citing a possible exemption, as the information relates to international relations.
Border Security Command responded just days later to inform GB News its request for details on accommodation costs, court costs and expenses incurred would “exceed the appropriate limit of £600” and suggested refining the request.
However, the Home Office made a similar suggestion when it rejected a request for information on total payments made to France since 2018.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp told GB News at the time: “Shabana Mahmood is trying to hide the cost of her scheme because it isn’t working.
“Since it started, more than 25,178 arrived by small boat and 24,570 were allowed to stay.
“With a 97.5 per cent chance of illegal Channel immigrants staying, this scheme has no chance of deterring anyone.
“The only way to fix this is the Conservative plan to leave the ECHR which will mean all illegal immigrants can be deported on arrival.
“That will be a real deterrent, and then the crossings will stop. But this Labour Government is too weak to do it.”
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