Despite leaving the door open to Albania, Ms Cooper suggested that she was more interested in how the Italians used it as a platform for fast-track deportations.
“We think there are other ways to develop a new fast track system. It’s something we’ve always been interested in to make sure that those who have come from predominantly safe countries can have their cases very swiftly, properly and fairly decided, and then also be swiftly returned as well,” she said.
Her comments came as eight migrants died on Sunday trying to cross the Channel, when their dinghy hit rocks and sank off the North French coast.
It brings the total number of deaths so far this year to 45 compared with just 12 last year. A 10 month old baby with hypothermia was among six others taken to hospital for treatment. Only 10 of the 60 migrants on board had life jackets.
Ms Cooper said she was concerned at the increasing number of people that the smuggling gangs were cramming on the boats and their greater use of violence when attempts were made to stop them leaving the beaches.
“A lot of this is about them being driven to try and make more money, which is what makes this such a horrific trade in people. So they are cramming more people into boats. We’ve seen women and children ending up being crushed to death or drowning as a result of being crammed into these boats,” she said.
“We’ve also seen these life jackets, which really are not life jackets at all, just sort of flimsy things pretending to be life jackets, which is more part of duping people, conning people, making them pay extra for a life jacket that isn’t a life jacket.”
Her comments follow the appointment of Martin Hewitt, the former Scotland Yard chief who led the police response to the Covid pandemic, to take charge of the new border security command targeting the gangs behind the Channel crossings.
He will lead hundreds of investigators, police officers and prosecutors from the National Crime Agency (NCA), MI5, Border Force and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) who will get new powers to treat people smugglers like terrorists.