COAST CRISIS
Suella Braverman warns UK faces ‘invasion of southern coast’ as illegal migrants could get £6K each in compensation
UNDER-fire Suella Braverman last night claimed Britain faces an “invasion of our southern coast” — as it emerged illegal migrants could net £6,000 each in compo.
The Home Secretary is fighting to keep her job after massive overcrowding at the Manston migrant processing centre in Kent.
“High numbers” could now take legal action against the government for keeping them at the site for longer than lawful, Braverman admitted to MPs.
Labour and other critics claim Ms Braverman is to blame because she refused to move some of the migrants to hotel accommodation instead.
In furious scenes in the Commons, she hit back: “The British people deserve to know which party is serious about stopping the invasion on our southern coast and which party is not.
“Let’s stop pretending they are all refugees in distress, the whole country knows that is not true.”
Turning her fire on her own department, she savaged Britain’s “hopelessly lax asylum system” saying “it is broken”
But she denied accusations she had “deliberately” blocked bookings at new hotels at an average £150 per room a night, and said she was the victim of a “political witch-hunt” ignoring the “facts of the problem”.
At least one legal firm is eyeing up challenges for migrants at the centre, which is only meant to hold them for up to 48 hours.
Insiders predict the migrants would have at least a 70 per cent chance of winning a judicial review, with others saying Ms Braverman was warned directly that the Home Office faced an imminent challenge
She admitted that the UK was struggling to cope with the sheer scale of arrivals, saying it was “impossible” to procure the needed beds at short notice.
Another 468 migrants arrived in small boats on Sunday, after nearly 1,000 came on Saturday.
She insisted she had “never ignored legal advice” to rent more hotels despite the “ruinous” £6.8million a day cost.
But she did admit breaking the ministerial code six more times by using her personal email for government business.
Detention Action said: “Compensation is available when someone has been unlawfully detained.”
The Refugee Council’s Enver Solomon said last night: “This kind of dreadful rhetoric is not only fundamentally wrong, it is incredibly dangerous.
"She’s totally unfit to be Home Secretary.”
Blogger: a bit poor when a 'Refugee Council' doesn't even know what a refugee actually is!
