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Defense leaders are considering a request from the Home Office for help in dealing with migrants trying to cross the English Channel.
The Home Office said it was possible the Royal Navy could be deployed to patrol the migrant traffic.
The Department of Defense (MoD) said on Saturday it was “working hard” to identify how best to help.
It comes after a record number of unaccompanied migrant children arrived in the UK on Friday.
On Saturday morning, the BBC filmed a rubber boat carrying a maximum of 20 people on board, including a baby, away from a tourist beach in the north of France.
BBC Europe reporter Gavin Lee said the ‘congested’ boat was stranded on the water’s edge for almost an hour, adding that there was no sign of French authorities’ surveillance on the beach at Gravelines harbor.
And across the Channel in Dover, BBC reporter Simon Jones said the UK Coast Guard had to deal with a number of incidents of migrants coming ashore.
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Simon Jones
Migrants and Border Force officers in Kingsdown, on the shores of the English Channel of Kent
Our reporter said that local people were asking themselves why there was no more action being taken by the French to patrol the coastline, but French authorities have said they need more money from the UK government.
Questions have also been raised as to why once people arrive in the UK, they are not sent back to France.
Ministers said they would put pressure on French authorities on migrants trying to cross the canal.
Home Secretary Priti Patel described the situation as “complex”, and said in a tweet on Friday that the government has “serious legislative, legal and operational barriers”.
‘Political failures’
On Saturday, the MoD said it would do “everything it can” to support the government.
“We are assessing the need for formal military assistance with the help of the civilian process and are working hard to identify how we can assist most effectively,” it said in a statement.
But an unnamed MoD source also told the PA agency that the idea of using the navy was “completely potty”.
The source said such action would be “unfavorable and unnecessary” and that military means should not be used to tackle “political failures”.
The MoD is generally used only within the United Kingdom when civilian authorities are unable to handle a crisis or require specialist military skills.
Examples include bomb disposal experts who misused large World War II bombs and the army conducting coronavirus tests at the height of coronavirus shelling.
That, because there is no suggestion that the UK Border Force will come under penalty, military planners will want to know exactly what they expect to do that could not be better resolved through talks with Paris.
There is potential use by the Royal Navy to physically repeal Australia’s controversial policy of physically repatriating migrant boats.
But there are no international waters in Dover Strait to repel them – so such an operation would require British ships to enter French seas – and permission from our formal neighbor to do so.
Not only this, it would risk a drowning incident – a complete reversal of current policies and legal obligations to pluck people from the sea.
Former Labor Secretary Jack Straw said any attempt to model Australia’s controversial “push back” tactics – used against migrants traveling from Indonesia – would not work and could lead to malicious hijacking.
“The crucial point here, of course, is that it requires the cooperation of the French,” Mr Straw said.
Meanwhile, Bella Sankey, director of the Detention Action Rights Campaign, condemned the idea of forcing boats back into French waters as “an unhinged proposal” that would be met with legal challenges.
“It’s illegal, it’s really dangerous and could seriously endanger human lives,” she added.
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In the Daily Telegraph wrote, Immigration Minister Chris Philp said migrants should be fingerprinted. However, it is unclear what the proposal will amount to, as the fingerprints of asylum seekers are already stored under the European Union’s Eurodac system.
Mr. Philp said migrants knew “that they would have real consequences if they tried to cross again”, adding that he would “negotiate hard” with French officials on how to deal with the crossings.
Former UK Border Force chief Tony Smith said smugglers had identified a “loophole” in international law.
The 1951 UN Refugee Conference states that once one is in the jurisdiction of a country – such as territorial waters – authorities are obliged to rescue people, bring them ashore, and allow them to submit an asylum application, told Mr Smith against BBC Radio 4’s Today program.
However, under a long-standing EU deal, called “Dublin III”, the United Kingdom has the right to repatriate anyone seeking asylum if they could have reasonably requested it in another country en route.
That arrangement will expire at the end of the Brexit transition period – next January – unless the United Kingdom and the EU agree on a similar agreement.
Migrants saw deployment from France
Our team arrived this morning just before the first light to the main tourist beach of Petit Fort Philippe at Gravelines, 20 miles east of Calais.
Within minutes, we saw more than 20 migrants carrying a rubber boat and its engine in the distance.
They held it above their heads as they walked 15 minutes from the dunes, past the huts from the beach to the sea.
Children sat at the back, holding hands and carrying wheels. When they first got into the water, they were clearly in trouble.
The boat was loaded with 21 people on board, drew water and returned to shore.
Several men, who turned out to be smuggling, appeared from the dunes to the shore and rescued a woman and her children from the boat. They then set off again.
It looked dangerously close to sinking and was still too full despite the calm waters.
In total, it took almost an hour before the boat left. At this time, there was no sign of a single oversight. We called the police to warn them, worried that the boat might be in grave danger.
They told us they were on their way. Four hours later there is still no sign of it.
Several bird potters on the beach witnessed the same thing. One told us that this is the third time this week that boats have left here, and that he heard children screaming every time before they got into the boat.
More than 1,000 migrants arrived off the coast of the UK in July by small boats, while 235 were detained this Thursday – the record for one day.
Second Chamber members have launched an inquiry into the growing numbers entering the UK, while Labor minister has been accused of “not getting on with the crisis”.
‘Defies faith’
Fisherman Matt Coker told the BBC it was “very common” for people to try to cross the canal in inflatable boats, adding that he saw them “every calm day”.
“Some of the things I have seen it contradict the belief,” Mr Coker said, adding that he had witnessed people crossing the Channel in inflatable canoes and kayaks with shovels and pieces of wood.
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PA Media
More than 100 migrants are expected to arrive in the UK on Friday
Meanwhile, French police have told the BBC they are catching more migrants trying to get to the UK by sea than ever before.
Officers said they intercepted 10 times the number of migrants from boats in French waters in July this year, compared to the same period last year.
They said their success rate in catching migrants has increased from 40% in 2019 to 47% in 2020.
