Shabana Mahmood’s latest crackdown on illegal working has been written off as insufficient to fix border control issues, a former Immigration Minister told GB News.
Kevin Foster, armed with three years’ worth of experience in the Home Office under the Tories, urged the Home Secretary to go further to effectively halt arrivals, despite skyrocketing immigration under his own Government.
Ms Mahmood’s latest crackdown has seen raids soaring by 77 per cent in a bid to tackle illegal working up and down the country.
In the same breath, the Government boasted its 50,000 deportation figure of those working in the UK illegally since moving into No10.
But while Labour “can be pleased” with such figures, Kevin Foster said, he queried whether it was the right course of action to really slash the number of small boat arrivals.
He told GB News: “[The deportation figure] fits in with their sort of smashed the gang style approach, the idea that they’re going to really focus on law enforcement around tackling small boats.
“Although it’s worth noting that many of those who will be being arrested or dealt with for illegal working won’t be people who’ve arrived in a small boat, although that’ll be part of it.
“There’ll be people, for example, those who’ve come on a tourist visa from places like Turkey who then decide to try and then try to find work and work whilst there was not having permission to do so.
Shabana Mahmood’s crackdown on illegal working has been written off as insufficient to fix border control issues
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GB NEWS
“So yes, the Government can be pleased with these figures.
“But you know, we do have to remember that last year we saw another increase in the number of small boat arrivals.
“So just doing this on its own is not going to resolve some of the issues people see with border control.”
Ms Mahmood’s statement went further and bragged about the staggering boost in arrests from July 2024 to December 2025, which stood at 83 per cent.
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The Home Secretary said she would ‘stop at nothing to restore order and control to our borders’
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PA
This translated into 12,300 arrests from 14,400 enforcement raids on crooked businesses employing illegal labour.
Ms Mahmood said: “There is no place for illegal working in our communities. That is why we have surged enforcement activity to the highest level in British history, so illegal migrants in the black economy have nowhere to hide.
“I will stop at nothing to restore order and control to our borders.”
The more regular raids were crafted to act as a deterrent after French politicians described Britain as an “El Dorado” in a jibe at Britain’s black economy history.
The move hopes to bring an end to “asylum shopping” by migrants enticed by Britain’s support for refugees.
As it stands, refugee status for asylum seekers is due to be made temporary and reviewed every 30 months under a sweeping set of reforms introduced by the Labour Minister.
“The UK public deserves to know facts and the truth about the Government’s efforts to tackle illegal migration,” a Whitehall source stressed, on Labour’s latest crunch on illegal working.
The Government will launch a TikTok account called Secure Borders UK to prevent “people being exploited by fake news superspreaders”.
“It will also act as a channel to show those paying people smugglers that you will be caught if you come to the UK illegally, and deported,” the source said.