Burnham urged to join EU pact to tackle small boats and fix Brexit ‘mess’
The Liberal Democrats have urged Andy Burnham and the government to take the UK into the EU's Migration and Asylum Pact as a way of tackling Channel small boat crossings. Party leader Sir Ed Davey argued that Brexit has undermined Britain's ability to check migrants crossing the Channel, since the Home Office lost access to EU-wide databases containing criminal records and information on rejected asylum applications, and he accused Reform and the Conservatives of exploiting a crisis of their own making.
Under the plan, joining the pact would let the UK legally return migrants to the first EU country they entered and restore access to the bloc's biometric database, which the Lib Dems say would remove a key "pull factor" and disrupt smuggling gangs' business model. The EU pact itself, in force since 12 June, requires asylum seekers to claim asylum in the first country they enter and introduces new screening, registration and biometric tracking rules alongside fast-track procedures for low-likelihood claims; campaign groups European Movement and Best for Britain also backed closer UK-EU cooperation, though the latter warned that piecemeal bilateral deals would not match full access to EU systems.
- Lib Dems urge UK to join EU's Migration and Asylum Pact over small boats.
- Sir Ed Davey blames Brexit for lost access to EU migrant data.
- Plan would allow returns of migrants to their first EU entry country.
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Small boat crossings usually refer to people making the dangerous journey across the Channel to seek asylum in the UK. Asylum is protection sought by someone who says they would face danger if returned to their country; under current rules, reaching the UK does not by itself decide whether their claim will succeed.
Brexit changed how the UK works with EU countries on migration and access to shared information systems. The EU’s Migration and Asylum Pact sets common procedures for screening and registering people who arrive in the bloc, and for deciding which country handles an asylum claim.
Andy Burnham is the mayor of Greater Manchester, while the UK government makes decisions on immigration policy. The debate matters because it concerns how the UK and EU share information and responsibility for asylum claims, and what effect closer cooperation might have on Channel crossings.
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Joining represents pragmatic policy-making in response to a genuine crisis: Brexit severed the UK from EU databases containing criminal records and asylum rejections, creating a security gap that contributes directly to Channel deaths. The pact is a focused technical agreement, not EU membership, that would restore these tools and enable the return of migrants to their first EU entry point, disrupting smuggling networks and removing the perverse incentive structures that drive crossing attempts. Evidence from other participating nations shows this approach is effective, and rejecting a practical solution on ideological grounds means accepting preventable deaths when working systems are available.
The case against
Rejoining EU asylum frameworks reverses the core democratic mandate of the 2016 vote for British independence in border control, and ceding this authority to Brussels represents a significant step backwards. Relying on other EU members to turn back migrants is practically unreliable when those states have incentives to move people onwards, creating risk that Britain becomes a dumping ground for unwanted asylum seekers. Rather than returning to EU dependency, genuine solutions exist: strengthened bilateral arrangements with France, domestic processing capacity, and offshore solutions that exercise British sovereignty whilst addressing the crisis effectively.