There has been a rapid rise in the number of Albanians crossing the English Channel in recent years.

One of the reasons that has been given for this surge is the fact that Albanian criminal gangs have gained a foothold in the north of France.

Prior to this, Afghans were the largest group following the Taliban’s return to power in their home country.

People fleeing persecution or hardship in Syria, Iraq and Iran also make up a significant number of asylum seekers in the UK.

Dominic Casciani
Legal Correspondent

We've still not seen the legislation - so in the meantime let's have a look at some really important practical challenges.

For a start, if the government wants to detain people as they arrive over the English Channel - there is a big question about where it would put them. Last year's 45,000 arrivals is equivalent to the capacity of half of the UK's prisons - and they're all full of criminals.

Secondly, I'm told that judges and courts managers are really concerned about the impact on the tribunal that hears asylum appeals.

It has a huge backlog of 29,000 cases - and it's now taking almost a year for each to get a decision.

These tribunals could be clogged up further by challenges over detention and removal if, as the Home Secretary has pointed out to MPs, the plan breaches human rights safeguards.

Reality Check

Suella Braverman told MPs: “We’ve seen a 500% increase in small boat crossings in two years.”

There has been a large increase, but it’s not quite 500%.

Home Office figures estimate that 45,755 people arrived in small boats in 2022, compared with 8,461 in 2020.

That’s an increase of 440%.

Image source, .

"Groundhog day" is how Labour's shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper described the home secretary's speech at the dispatch box.

Cooper accused Suella Braverman of making similar pledges before and said "just a few" migrants were returned last year from 18,000 considered inadmissible to the UK.

The shadow home secretary also:

• blamed the government for letting people smugglers "off the hook"
• said if the government was serious, it would be working to get a "proper new agreement in place" with France and Europe
• labelled the government's bill "a con" and said it "isn't a solution"
• ended her response by saying the plans risk "making the chaos worse" and added "Britain deserves better"

We've been hearing what MPs make of the Illegal Migration Bill over the past hour.

Let's take a look back at some of the key points from the home secretary's statement. She says:

• The bill will "allow us to stop the boats" - one of the prime minister's key pledges made at the start of the year
• Many migrants arriving in the UK come from multiple safe countries, and the need for reform is "obvious and urgent"
• The British people have been "taken for a ride" and that "enough is enough"
• The bill allows for the detention of illegal arrivals without bail or judicial review within the first 28 days of detention until they can be removed

• An annual cap, determined by Parliament, on the number of refugees the UK will resettle via "safe and legal routes" will be introduced
• She is "confident" the bill complies with international law - specifically the UN Refugee Convention and European Convention on Human Rights
• Illegal migration in the UK is "already unsustainable" and part of a larger global migration crisis

Damian Grammaticas
Political correspondent

The debate clearly illustrates how Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman hope to try to corner Labour.

Their aim is to paint Labour as weak when it comes to stopping boats. Labour’s Yvette Cooper launched into her attack on the new legislation saying it does little different to that passed by Priti Patel a year ago and that hasn’t solved the problem, rather made it worse.

Labour wants to portray the government as ineffective. Its plan is to call for more serious cross-border police action and says the government is stirring up this issue to “have someone else to blame.”

The prepared retort from Braverman was that Labour’s leader Keir Starmer “doesn’t want to stop the boats”.

The issue didn’t figure in his “missions” for his leadership, she said, seeking to draw a contrast with Sunak.

The new policy is already being put to work to try to frame people’s views of the government and its opponents.

We're moving away now from MPs' questions - but in case you missed this earlier, here's the home secretary's statement to the House of Commons a little while back.

Simon Clarke, Conservative MP for Middlesborough South and East Cleveland, says his constituents want illegal immigration controlled and it is a "top priority" for them.

He asks if the proposed legislation is frustrated by the European Convention on Human Rights, will the UK leave it?

The home secretary replies it was "deeply regrettable" the ECHR had frustrated government plans in the past and she was addressing the issue "to avoid that issue playing out again".

She says this bill complies with internal obligations in her view.

Green MP Caroline Lucas says that it is "Orwellian, as well as morally repugnant" to ban people from claiming asylum unless they use a legal route when they "barely exist" or "they don't function".

She asks if Braverman intends to open functioning safe and legal routes.

Braverman says her "faux outrage" is commendable.

She adds that the UK has "accepted nearly 500,000 people through safe and legal routes" for humanitarian reasons.

Conservative MP Peter Bone is next on his feet.

"People coming across in small boats are smuggled and spend thousands of pounds to get here," he says.

But many of them "claim exemption under the Modern Slavery Act".

He asks if the home secretary has taken this into account and adds it's "damaging the genuine victims of human trafficking, this abuse".

Braverman responds by saying there has been "a massive influx of people claiming to be victims of modern slavery", which she says stops the government helping "the genuine victims".

Labour MP Stella Creasy says one of her constituents risked his life for the UK in Afghanistan but his children are not eligible to come to the UK.

She accuses the government of failing to provide safe and legal routes.

The home secretary says the UK has welcomed almost 500,000 people who are fleeing war and persecution to the UK.

“I warmly welcome the principle of the bill, not least as the whole house knows these people traffickers are immoral and utterly heartless,” says Tory MP Mark Francois.

However, he says the “elephant in the room” is the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

“Unless we can somehow face them down, we will remain tied up in legal knots in our own domestic courts and ultimately in Strasbourg.”

He wants assurance that the bill will address this, to which the home secretary replies that it contains specific articles that will send a message to the judiciary about how Parliament intends it to be interpreted.

Labour's Khalid Mahmood, MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, takes to his feet to say the home secretary knows her proposed legislation is not workable and she does not have return agreements.

He accuses her of trying to appeal to voters at the the expense of xenophobia and racism.

The home secretary replies Mahmood is "irresponsible" to describe someone who wants to control borders as racist.

"It's wrong and it should not be put forward," she adds.

Conservative MP Rehman Chishti mentions the Lancaster House agreement with France signed in 2010. He asks how the new measures will address challenges previously experienced to ensure decisive action on illegal migration.

Braverman says a new deal was struck with France at the end of last year, which saw an increase of French personnel patrolling beaches there and British Border Force officers are now working more closely with French police officers.

This led to greater collaboration and intelligence sharing, she adds.

Plaid Cymru MP Hywel Williams is up next and asks about a Syrian refugee who escaped from the Islamic State group "for her own safety" and has now settled in Wales.

He says this refugee "thinks that the government's plans will make others in her situation feel suicidal".

The home secretary responds by saying she's "proud of our track-record of welcoming people through humanitarian routes".

Labour MP John McDonnell, who also served in Jeremy Corbyn's shadow cabinet, says he welcomes asylum seekers in hotels in his constituency and says many come from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

He says he has spoken to some of them, adding that many have shown him wounds and signs of torture.

He says many want to contribute to British society but are "trapped in the system" because of the processing backlog.

He ends his question by asking the home secretary to "tone down the inflammatory language".

Braverman says the government is making good progress on tackling the backlog.

Labour MP Hilary Benn questions whether the measures outlined in the bill are compatible with the UK’s international obligations under the 1951 Refugee Convention.

Ms Braverman replies that the bill introduces measures that the government considers to be compliant with “all of our international obligations”.

“Of that we are certain,” she adds.

Tory MP for Thurrock Jackie Doyle-Price gets to her feet to ask if lessons can be learnt from the 39 people dying in the back of a lorry in her constituency?

The home secretary says she is right to focus on criminal gangs, and there have been 300 arrests and 50 gangs broken up.

She adds work continues to stop the criminals.

Dominic Casciani
Legal Correspondent

The home secretary's statement to the House of Commons sets out the politics and the objectives - and it's full of questions about whether it's legally water-tight.

For a start, the UK has an obligation to consider asylum claims - but how does it do that if it is denying people the right to make that claim? Secondly, there are strict rules around detaining people if they are not going to be imminently removed from the UK.

Given the UK has few returns agreements in place with safe third countries, it's not clear where all these people will be held and whether that amounts to unlawful imprisonment.

Suella Braverman has told MPs that the legislation would not come with a formal confirmation that it complies with human rights law - but she has not explained why.

The fact that Ms Braverman cannot provide it means that her own lawyers behind the scenes are telling her that it could get pulled to pieces in the courts - and she is under a duty to alert MPs to that possibility.

SNP MP Joanna Cherry asks if the point of the legislation is so that the domestic courts will find it is incompatible with international law and European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), allowing the Conservatives to fight the next general election on a promise to take the UK out of the ECHR.

Braverman says many denounced the Rwanda partnership as unlawful, but the High Courts ruled it was compliant.