The small-boats crisis has made British women and girls less safe, Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick warns today.
The top Tory admits he fears for his own three young daughters against a backdrop of illegal migrants with ‘medieval attitudes’ crossing the Channel.
His comments follow a nationwide series of protests by angry parents outside hotels being used to house asylum seekers.
In a candid article for The Mail on Sunday, Mr Jenrick states: ‘I certainly don’t want my children to share a neighbourhood with men from backward countries who broke into Britain illegally, and about whom we know next to nothing.
‘And I don’t want anyone else’s family to have this forced on them either.’
Mr Jenrick, whose daughters are 14, 12 and ten, says the Channel crossings are now a ‘national security emergency’.
It comes as:
- An illegal immigrant from Sudan living in an asylum seeker hotel has been charged with the sexual assault of a woman last Monday in Warwickshire.
- Another migrant in a taxpayer-funded hotel in London has been arrested on suspicion of strangling a woman in public.
- Ministers will change the law to be able to ‘immediately’ deport foreign criminals – instead of waiting for them to serve out part of their sentence in England and Wales.
The spate of crimes perpetrated by illegal migrants in just two months has made some families fearful for their women and girls.
Mr Jenrick references the shocking case where two Afghan asylum seekers were charged over the alleged rape of a 12-year-old girl in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, a story broken by his newspaper last week which triggered a furious backlash.
‘It’s no wonder fair-minded people are furious,’ Mr Jenrick writes. ‘They’re right to be. When I see these stories, I can’t help but think that it could have been one of my three young daughters.
‘My eldest daughter is 14 and already I worry about her safety as she starts to do things independently. It’s challenging enough without this to contend with.’
Mr Jenrick calls for tougher action on deporting criminals back to their home countries, and says foreign aid should be suspended from those countries if they resist accepting them.
Pakistan should have its £133 million aid and visa access cut if it continues to block deportations, he says.
The former immigration minister resigned from Rishi Sunak’s government after saying that not enough was being done to tackle migration.
He comes to the defence of the British public who have been ‘gaslit’ over the spread of illegal migration and being told that as many women and children make small-boat crossings as men, when ‘nearly 90 per cent are men’.
‘I can only sympathise with the mothers and fathers peacefully protesting outside asylum hotels who have been pushed to breaking point,’ Mr Jenrick writes.
‘They will have read the stories of illegal migrants loitering around schools and parks, many of which have deplorable attitudes towards women.
‘Quite understandably parents refuse to sit back while their family’s safety is jeopardised. Their response is natural: we must protect our children.’
He acknowledges his comments will be ‘sneered at by the metropolitan elite, safely ensconced in their ivory towers’.
‘Only at the turn of this year I was criticised for saying some of those who have migrated to the UK have, frankly, medieval attitudes to women.’
Mr Jenrick says foreign aid must be immediately cut to any countries that refuse deportations of their nationals who commit crimes on British soil – ‘even if they’ve qualified for settlement’ in Britain.
He writes: ‘If countries won’t take back their citizens, we should suspend the granting of visas and foreign aid until they do.
‘Just recently it was reported Pakistan was refusing to take back three rapists until the UK allows direct flights between the two countries via its national airline, PIA, which were grounded due to safety concerns.
‘This is a country we give £133 million in aid to. Enough. Starmer should suspend that money if the Pakistani authorities don’t do the right thing.’
He also calls for the Ministry of Justice to publish the background of criminals by their nationality, country of birth, visa status, asylum status and their method of entry to the UK, and said failing to do so would make Sir Keir Starmer ‘complicit in a scandalous cover-up’.
‘It’s obvious that some societies have higher levels of violent and sexual crime, and individuals who migrate from those countries to the UK are unlikely to shed that baggage quickly.
‘The truth is that mass, uncontrolled immigration has been fuelling crime and made women and girls less safe. But out of a mixture of bureaucratic inertia and weak leadership, the data has been covered up.’
Last night the Ministry of Justice did not comment.
