Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has vowed to crack down on illegal migration (Image: Getty)
The UK could suspend visas from countries that do not "play ball" and agree to migrant returns deals, Shabana Mahmood has declared.
The new Home Secretary warned that countries must take back foreign criminals, failed asylum seekers and visa overstayers.
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And Ms Mahmood vowed to do "whatever it takes" to stop small boat crossings, adding she will go "further and faster" than Yvette Cooper.
She said: "For countries that do not play ball, we've been talking about how we can take much more co-ordinated action between the Five Eyes countries.
"For us, that means including possibly the cutting of visas in the future, just to say, you know, we do expect countries to play play ball, play by the rules, and if one of your citizens has no right to be in our country, you do need to take them back."
Vowing to do "whatever it takes" to stop small boat crossings, she added: "This is a Labour Government with Labour policy and Labour proposals.
"We've been looking at this for some time. It's been discussed already across the Government and I'm very clear that there has to be a strong approach to maintaining our border, and that does mean saying to countries who do not take their citizens back that we're not simply going to allow our laws to remain unenforced."
Her announcement follows a pledge by Reform UK to use a combination of financial incentives and sanctions, including possible visa restrictions, to secure returns agreements as part of a commitment to deport 600,000 people over five years.
Asked how she would be different to her predecessor Yvette Cooper, Ms Mahmood said: “I will be looking to go further and faster, because I am very clear. I have one top priority in this job, and that is to secure the borders.
“I will do whatever it takes. And for those who have worked with me already in government and in my previous brief, I think people can tell I’m not the sort of person that hangs around.”
Ms Mahmood also claimed other countries are looking to Britain to play a "leading role" in reforming the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
She told broadcasters: "The debate in Europe is starting to change. Other countries are actually trying to have this conversation around reform of the convention.
"That's not been the case previously, where maybe Britain was seen as more of a lone operator, a little bit more isolated in trying to make that case.
"I was very struck when I visited the Council of Europe in Strasbourg just a couple of months or so ago how much other people wanted to talk to me about Britain playing the leading role in that discussion around reform of the convention.
"I'm very happy to step into that space. I think that we can play a good role in moving those conversations along.
"So, I think we're not isolated. Other countries are struggling with the challenges of mass migration, maintaining our borders, and I think that this is a useful time for us to have a refreshed conversation, and I'm confident we can make more progress."
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A staggering 1,097 asylum seekers crossed the Channel in 17 boats on Saturday – Ms Mahmood’s first day in office.
This took the total past 30,000 in record time, ramping up pressure on Sir Keir Starmer and his ministers after Friday’s chaotic reshuffle.
Ms Mahmood confirmed she will “explore all options to restore order to our immigration system”, adding that the first Channel migrants will be sent back to France “imminently”.
Nothing is “off the table”, sources close to the Home Secretary said. The Home Secretary said on Sunday night: “These small boat crossings are utterly unacceptable and the vile people smugglers behind them are wreaking havoc on our borders.
"Thanks to our deal with France, people crossing in small boats can now be detained and removed to France and I expect the first returns to take place imminently.
"Protecting the UK border is my priority as Home Secretary and I will explore all options to restore order to our immigration system."
Some 1,097 migrants crossed the Channel in 17 boats on Saturday, bringing the total in 2025 to 30,100, Home Office figures show.
This is up 37% on this point last year (22,028) and 37% higher than at this stage in 2023 (21,918).
Ms Mahmood is expected to rewrite human rights laws to prevent foreign criminals and failed asylum seekers from avoiding deportation.
She is set to tighten up “the interpretation and the application” of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights – the right to a family life.
This could be done in the form of new guidance or even legislation.
The new Home Secretary last week warned that British judges are taking a “maximalist” approach to the European Convention on Human Rights.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said: “The new Home Secretary is admitting that after a year of Labour government, the gangs are ‘wreaking havoc’ on our borders.
“These are the same gangs Labour promised to ‘smash’ at the last election. They are now admitting they have failed.
“If they had any sense, they would bring back the Rwanda plan and immediately deport all illegal arrivals the minute their feet touched British soil.”
Mr Philp added: “This has been the worst year in history for illegal Channel crossings and we clearly have a full-blown borders crisis.
“They tore up the only deterrent this country had on day one, our Rwanda plan, and have replaced it with nothing but hollow slogans.
“They might have changed Home Secretary, but the thousands of young men still streaming across the Channel and the fact this year has broken all records for illegal crossing shows this Labour Government is too weak to do what is needed.”
Defence Secretary John Healey on Sunday confirmed military planners are scrambling to find barracks to house asylum seekers and “accelerate” the closure of migrant hotels.
They are working alongside the Home Office to end the asylum accommodation crisis, which has led to taxpayers shelling out ￡5.7m a day on hotels and migrants being moved into flats and houses across the country.
Ms Mahmood is expected to set out more details on the plans within weeks.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer carried out a major reshuffle over the weekend, including wide-ranging changes at the Home Office, in a bid to draw a line under the fallout from Angela Rayner's resignation and a difficult summer dominated by criticism of the small boats crisis.
The Prime Minister has told his new-look Cabinet to "go up a gear" in delivering on Labour's agenda, part of which now involves a toughened immigration policy as he faces pressure in the polls from Nigel Farage's Reform UK.
The Government is now considering using defence sites as temporary asylum accommodation as ministers seek to speed up plans to end the use of hotels after they became a focal point for demonstrations in recent weeks.
Defence minister Luke Pollard said bases with existing housing blocks or large areas of hard standing which could be used for temporary accommodation would be considered, along with non-military sites.
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He told ITV's Good Morning Britain: "We've deployed a military planning team into Border Security Command and the Home Office to look at military and non-military sites, about where we can help build temporary but adequate accommodation that enables us to transfer those folks from asylum hotels into that temporary accommodation so we can close even more hotels.
"We've closed 25 in the last year, but the Prime Minister is clear he wants every single one of them closed."
He added: "The Ministry of Defence has expertise that no other Government department has and so that's precisely why we're using the military planners - those experts that delivered so much of the additional support during Covid, for instance, that respond to emergencies nationwide - we're using those skilled people to support this effort, and certainly getting on top of this issue is a Government priority."
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