Brexit Britain must take control of migrant crisis, warns Nigel Farage

Brexit Britain must take back control of its borders to help solve the worsening cross-channel migrant crisis, Nigel Farage has warned.

Writing in the Daily Express the former Brexit Party leader slammed France and the EU for failing to “lift a finger” to prevent the dangerous crossings. And he challenged Brussels and French President Emmanuel Macron to agree to a summit otherwise many lives will be lost and British communities will continue to suffer.

The GB News broadcaster said: “The more money we send to France the greater the numbers that come.

“To resolve this we need the French and Brussels to cooperate, but they refuse to lift a finger to help Brexit Britain.”

Nigel Farage said the only way to end the trade in smuggling people across the Channel is to deter migrants by showing they would be turned back at sea, or removed from the UK if they reached its shores.

“Our only option is to put migrant boats under tow and return them to the safe country of France then our former EU partners would come to the negotiating table,” he added.

Last year, it was reported that almost 300 migrants had died trying to cross the Channel since 1999.

Mr Farage hit out as the European Union was accused of playing politics with the migrant crisis by deliberately impeding progress on a potential deal with France.

UK sources claim the European Commission is "turning a blind eye to people dying" by refusing to enter talks to allow Britain to send migrants who have crossed the Channel back to France.

EU officials are understood to have insisted that the right to negotiate asylum and readmission agreement rests entirely with the bloc, and not individual member states.