Keir Starmer’s visit to the Italian prime minister has a certain tourist vibe to it. “Such fantastic weather,” he announced.
Just like any curious Englishman on holiday wanting to explore the stunning Dolomites, the ancient wonders of Pompeii or just spend a few weeks at their charming little second home in Puglia, the British PM has jetted down to Rome for a guided tour of the Italian government’s “illegal migration” policy.
Starmer is “interested to learn” all about how they have radically reduced irregular arrivals on Italian territory – usually the island outpost of Lampedusa, near the north African coast.
Starmer’s host, Italian premier Giorgia Meloni, heads a neo-fascistic political party, and must be one of the world’s most likeable leaders because this apparently makes no difference to those who meet her.
She was a favourite of Rishi Sunak, whose politics were a little more progressive; he called her “a beautiful person”. Starmer, the human rights advocate and solid social democrat, seems to be similarly enchanted. Ursula von der Leyen has been thankful to Meloni for seeing off the allies of Marine Le Pen in the European Parliament, and delivering a second term for the presidency of the EU Commission.
As Meloni points out the salient features of her policy and its intricacies, Starmer may well find himself equally impressed, but also disappointed by what he finds, because the Italian policy is not easily transferred to the English Channel – and if it were, we may be sure that Sunak would have done so while he still had the chance.
Just as Rome is not London, the Mediterranean Sea is not the English Channel. The distances are far greater, and the international politics very different. The main reason why the Italians have managed to cut the number of migrants by more than a half – Mediterranean boat crossings are 62 per cent down on last year – is that they have basically taken control of the Tunisian and Libyan border patrols, re-equipping and finding the local personnel as required. It is a bit neo-colonial, but it seems to have enjoyed success.
The UK isn’t going to be given quite the same role over the French coast – despite British Border Force officials enjoying observer status in some operations, and the £60m-plus in subsidies being transferred from London to Paris.
Similarly, the idea that we could just pick up migrants and take them back to Calais is one the most persistent and pernicious myths in the whole migration debate. Things might be better if we’d stayed in the EU and kept the Dublin Protocol, which did facilitate some returns, and was a basis for co-operation; but that’s all academic now, and there’s no sign that Starmer’s reset will make a difference.
The Albanian dimension is also something Starmer, accompanied by his new Border Commander, Martin Hewitt, is keen to find out about. Taking people from, say, Iran, off to be processed in a third country, such as Albania, has the attraction that that doesn’t mean they will be forced to settle there, even if their application is valid and accepted. The Italian system means that genuine refugees are then taken back from Albania to Italy and accepted for residence, under the European Convention.
It might form a mild deterrent for those who do then think they will get sent back to Tehran. But if most of them are genuine, then they don’t get put on a plane to Iran, and the irregular migration is not reduced. And if they are bogus, then they will have an additional incentive to arrive in mainland Italy surreptitiously and, by analogy, it is much easier to do that if you’ve only got to get from France to England.
Italy spends many millions building and running huge detention centres for the migrants – an option that successive British governments have been unwilling or unable to fund. So in trying to copy or learn lessons from Meloni’s policies, exquisite as they may be, Starmer is on a hiding to nothing.
The measures Meloni has taken to curb new arrivals are well suited to Italy’s geography and its particular needs, and something on which she is prepared to spend money – and without having to leave the European Convention on Human Rights to do so. Britain, outside the EU and hard up, needs to find its own solutions to the small boats crisis.
The “smash the gangs” campaign is part of that, as would have been “safe and secure” routes, had they not been quietly dropped by Yvette Cooper. The unavoidable truth is that the small boats have to be dealt with under the ECHR and international law, and that leaves few options other than to actually honour the solemn obligation to take in refugees, let them work (building homes would be a start), fill the labour shortage and boost the economy and society generally.
If the British Labour Party actually wants to abandon that principle of offering shelter to asylum seekers, it should say so. If not, Starmer and his colleagues should quit pretending that they can solve the crisis by copying the Italians, or anyone else.