Channel migrant crossing - latest: UK officials head to France as PM sets out five urgent steps to ease crisis

Hello, and welcome to The Independent’s rolling coverage on the Channel migrant crisis. Stay tuned as we bring you the latest updates after a boat sunk last night, killing dozens of people desperately seeking a new life in Britain.

Following conversations last night, Boris Johnson and French president Emmanuel Macron have committed to “keeping all options on the table” in their efforts to break up the human trafficking gangs – which they consider the route cause of the issue – responsible for putting desperate migrants at risk in one of the world’s busiest sea lanes.

Immigration compliance minister Tom Pursglove confirmed that the PM had renewed a previous offer to send UK police and Border Force officers to mount joint patrols with the French.

The aim is to prevent migrant boats from attempting the perilous crossing, however the French have previously resisted the suggestion amid concerns about the implications for their national sovereignty.

Mr Pursglove said, however, the last incident showed the two countries needed to deepen their cooperation in dealing with the issue.

“The prime minister and President Macron have had exactly that discussion this evening. That is something that I am very keen to see happen,” he told BBC2’s Newsnight.

“It is the case that in the past we have offered to host and to help with joint patrols. I think that could be invaluable in helping to address this issue. I really do hope that the French will reconsider that offer.”

Remarks from various French officials this morning, however, suggest the EU nation will not accept such a move.

Maya Konforti, secretary general of the French humanitarian organisation l’Auberge des Migrants, said the sinking of the migrant boat in the Channel last night was a “catastrophe”.

She told French TV channel BFMTV: “We were sure this would happen one day, but up ‘till now... when there have been deaths, it was one or two at a time, but this is a catastrophe.”

She said the NGO was working to identify the bodies, contact the families, organise the funerals and repatriate the bodies.

“When it’s one or two people it’s manageable, but with 31 people, we don’t know how we’re going to do it. It will be very, very complicated and it will also be very, very expensive.”

Ms Konforti also rubbished efforts by the UK government, and France’s interior minister Gerald Darmanin, to blame human traffickers, saying “the existence of smugglers is in response to a need – a need because there’s no legal way to go and seek asylum in Britain”.

The English Channel suffered its worst-ever migrant tragedy on Wednesday after a packed inflatable dinghy sank with the loss of at least 27 lives. (The original figure of 31 is now contested by French authorities, but no explanation has been offered for the discrepancy so far.)

Among those drowned were five women and a young girl, according to French interior minister Gerald Darmanin. He said that two survivors were fighting for their lives while another person appeared to still be missing.

After chairing a meeting of the government’s Cobra emergency committee to discuss the disaster, Boris Johnson declared himself “shocked, appalled and deeply saddened” and offered additional help to Paris to “demolish” people-smuggling gangs which he said were “getting away with murder”.

Andrew Woodcock, Holly Bancroft and Rory Sullivan have more:

Our political correspondent Ashley Cowburn reports:

Asked what can be done in practical terms to solve the migrant crisis, Pierre Henri Dumont, the MP for Calais, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “Well, I’m not sure that having more police officers… will help to stop these crossings.

“We’ve got 200 or 300km of shore to monitor 24/7 and it only takes five or ten minutes to take a boat and take at sea filled with migrants. I’m not sure it’s only a question about money and the question about the number of men.”

After calls from the British government to France to accept UK police and border officers, he added: “No, that wouldn’t work to monitor all the shore… there is also a question of sovereignty.

“I’m not sure the British people would accept the other way round if French army was patrolling the British shore.”

He continued: “I see two ways to try to handle this situation. The first one is in France to make sure there are no migrants around the shore.... prior to the shore find these migrants and put them in welcoming centres for them to have a rest, for them to have food, for them to have to have a roof.

The chairman of the ports of Calais and Boulogne has said of Wednesday’s tragic loss of life in the Channel he “thought it would happen one day”.

Jean-Marc Puissesseau told BBC Breakfast he was “personally very, very, very sad” about the deaths of dozens of migrants in the strait between France and England.

“But between us I can tell you, we thought it would happen one day because these people are taking such an enormous risk to get to your country,” he said.

“When they leave their country it’s because they are suffering there and they have only one idea and wish - to get to your country.

“And they are ready to risk their lives, as they did yesterday.”

Mr Puissesseau expressed hope the “enormous problem” of illegal migration via the Channel could be solved by the UK working together with European authorities.

“It’s an enormous problem. It is 20 years that we have migrants coming to Calais with only one wish - get to your country,” he said. “And it’s really time that Europe and the UK together, we try together to solve the problem.”

Continuing to blame smugglers for the current migrant crisis, a French politician said this morning heads of human trafficking networks who live comfortably in the UK must be arrested – like they are in France.

Franck Dhersin, vice president of transport for the northern Hauts-de-France region, told French TV station BFMTV: “In France what do we do? We arrest the smugglers...

“To fight them, there’s only one way - we need to stop the organisations, you need to arrest the mafia chiefs.

“And the mafia chiefs live in London... They live in London peacefully, in beautiful villas, they earn hundreds of millions of euros every year, and they reinvest that money in the City.

“And so it’s very easy for the tax authorities to find them”.

Home secretary Priti Patel’s messaging around the crisis has been to blame smugglers entirely, however various human rights groups say it is because of Ms Patel’s unworkable asylum and migrant system in the UK that smuggling operations even exist.

Following my earlier post (8am), here’s Ashley Cowburn with more on remarks made by the MP for Calais.

Pierre-Henri Dumont has suggested a British offer to provide police and border force for joint patrols along the coast of the Channel “wouldn’t work”, as he raised issues around sovereignty.

The politician's intervention comes after at least 27 people lost their lives attempting to make the treacherous journey across the English Chanel – the worst migrant tragedy in the region in recent history.

After an emergency meeting of the government’s Cobra committee, Boris Johnson said on Wednesday evening that France had previously rejected the offer of practical help from the UK.

An immigration charity has said the deaths of at least 27 migrants on Wednesday should mark a “turning point” in tackling the crisis, echoing remarks made by cross-Channel politicians who have admitted such a deadly incident was inevitable.

Zoe Gardner from the Joint Council of Welfare for Immigrants told BBC Breakfast: “This tragedy was completely predictable, indeed it was predicted and it was completely preventable”.

She added: “This has to be a time for our government to mark a turning point, this tragedy must not be allowed to continue and that means changing our approach, not more of the same failed policies.

“We need to offer people alternatives to the smuggling boats.

“The French are patrolling their own borders insufficiently, it’s absolutely horrendous, those images of the French police standing by while children got onto one of those unsafe vessels are shocking to me.”

Five people have been arrested in connection with the shipwreck that killed at least 27 migrants last night, France’s interior minister has said.

Following Zoe Tidman’s breaking report here: