The prime minister has announced an additional £75m for border security as he vowed to stamp out the “vile trade” of people smuggling.
Speaking at the Interpol General Assembly in Glasgow, Starmer said the UK was “resetting” its approach to the issue of people smuggling, pledging to increase international collaboration to help meet the challenge.
The PM said the additional £75m would bring investment in the Border Security Command over the next two years to £150m, helping to fund additional specialist investigators and surveillance equipment.
This will include 300 staff for the new Border Security Command, 100 specialist investigators and intelligence officers for the National Crime Agency, dedicated to tackling criminals who facilitate people smuggling, and the creation of a new specialist Organised Immigration Crime Intelligence Source Unit, which will cohere intelligence flows from key police forces.
The Border Security Command will also be given enhanced powers – through a new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill – to tackle organised immigration crime while providing for strong and effective border security.
The Labour government scrapped the previous government’s plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda, calling it a “gimmick”.
Starmer told delegates at the conference in the SEC that an effective collaboration to tackle people smuggling would be just as significant as the deal agreed when Glasgow hosted COP26 at the same venue in 2021.
He said: “It is your leadership today which can help make a decisive breakthrough in this vile trade in human life.
“If together, we can win this war against the people smugglers, then this gathering will have achieved a victory for humanity every bit as significant as the Glasgow climate pact because you will have helped to smash the gangs, secure our borders and save countless lives.”
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper added: “Criminal smuggler gangs profit from undermining our border security and putting lives at risk and they have been getting away with it for far too long.
“Our new Border Security Command, with the investment set out today, will mean a huge step change in the way we target these criminal gangs.”
The government also announced a £58m increase to the National Crime Agency's core budget for the 2025/26 financial year. This will be a 9% rise in funding compared to 2024/25.
National Crime Agency director general Graeme Biggar said: “Tackling organised crime, and especially immigration crime, remains a top priority for the NCA. We are currently leading around 70 investigations into the gangs or individuals involved in the highest echelons of this type of criminality, and we are devoting more resources to it than ever before.
“We are determined to do all we can to disrupt and dismantle these networks, wherever they operate.”
Commenting on the announcement, PCS general secretary Fran Heathcote said: “While we welcome the government’s commitment to tackle people smugglers, the best way to deal with deaths in the Channel is to adopt our Safe Routes policy that would create a safe and legal route for refugees to come to the UK and here begin their asylum claim.”
A version of this story originally appeared on CSW's sister site Holyrood.com