Small boats used by migrants to cross the Channel will be handed to British charities

HUNDREDS of small boats used by migrants to cross the Channel will be refurbished and handed to youth groups across the nation.

The dinghies used by people smugglers to make the perilous journey that are being stored in warehouses along the south coast will be put to good use.


Small boats used by migrants to cross the Channel will be handed to British charities
Migrant boats will be recycled and handed to charities

Sailing clubs in red wall areas are likely to get the pick of the vessels under plans being drawn up by Priti Patel.

Her new Nationality and Borders Bill gives border force the power to seize the boats – and hand them to charitable organisations.

A source said: “In some ways we hope this will make the most of a bad situation, so that these boats can do some good.

“They will all obviously be safety tested and checked to make sure they are sea worthy, but there are groups up and down the country who could benefit from having this sort of equipment.”

The Home Secretary’s new Nationality and Borders Bill, which is going through Parliament, gives Border Force the power to remove the boats from smugglers for “donation of the ship or other property to a charity or other not-for-profit body.”

It comes as the Home Office estimated 22,000 migrants will successfully make the perilous journey across the Channel this year.

Home Office minister Kit Malthouse said they were “fighting a large and quite sophisticated logistics operation.”

He added: “Our job is to try and get behind that business to understand how it works and then to degrade it, as well as trying to remove the incentive for people to come in the first place so that genuine refugees, who want to come to the UK can access those legitimate routes and come here safely and in a way that doesn’t put them at risk in the Channel.”