Our new study shows France took back less than 50 migrants a year from UK under ‘Dublin Agreement’
Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2025
Data reveals 82% of UK’s requests were never returned to France, despite EU rules
Today we can reveal some more bad news for the Prime Minister, ahead of the likely announcement of a new ‘Macron’s Migrants’ deal Sir Keir is planning to make during the French President’s visit starting tomorrow (Tuesday 08 Jul 2025).
On Saturday the Stand for Our Soveriegnty organisation, together with the Facts4EU think-tank, released a report exclusively to GB News showing the shocking facts of France’s lack of performance under the EU’s ‘Dublin agreement’ for returning migrants to the country they first entered.
Some Rejoiners have been suggesting that if the UK were still in the EU we would benefit from the Dublin agreement because we would be able to return our migrants to France. In fact that agreement ceased a few years after the UK left. Even if it were still in operation, the figures below show it would not have had any noticeable impact on the UK’s illegal migrants crossing the Channel.
The data Sir Keir would rather you didn’t see before Macron’s visit this week
The Stand for Our Sovereignty and Facts4EU teams conducted extensive research of all information available about the EU’s former ‘migrant returns’ deal, called the Dublin agreement. We used the official records of both the EU statistics agency and the UK Home Office, which of course did not agree in all details. We also researched French government files but these were unforthcoming.
Unfortunately for Sir Keir, however, both sets of data from the EU and the UK confirm three things:
- The French don’t seem to like taking back their illegal migrants, and
- They don’t seem to be very good at obeying EU regulations, and
- They took back a smaller and smaller percentage as the years went by
Stand for Our Sovereignty Summary
Percentage of illegal migrants France took back under the Dublin Agreement
(Note: Figures are for all the years we have been able to obtain.]
- 2008 : 52.8% (First year data is available)
- 2019 : 10.7% (Last pre-Covid year before Brexit)
© Stand for Our Sovereignty 2025 and Brexit Facts4EU.Org 2025 – click to enlarge
[Source(s) : EU Commission official statistics agency | Home Office]
France started by taking back only half its illegal migrants… and went downhill fast from there
Taking back only just over half the formal requests received from HM Government was not a good start for France. It must be remembered that this was an EU-wide agreement.
Only a dozen years later this already-low performance had become far worse. In 2019, the last reliable year for data such as this, the percentage was down to 10.7%. Almost one in 10. This is a very long way from the ‘one in, one out’ deal which Sir Keir is strongly rumoured to be signing this week.
The eminent constitutional expert in Parliament for many years, Sir Bill Cash, commented:
“Here is yet another example of Labour’s stream of cosmetic proposals to deal with issues. The real solution to these challenges, of course, lies in legislation.
“There is a need for clear and unambiguous legislation to override the European Convention on Human Rights, the Refugees Convention, the Human Rights Act, and other conventions, and by doing so in explicit terms the Supreme Court will accept.
“This is based on the all-important principle of legality, as evidenced in the case of an Iraqi national where the judgement was quite explicit about this in paragraph 144 of the Rwanda judgement itself: “…in any event, the principle of legality does not permit a court to disregard an unambiguous expression of Parliament’s intention such as that with which we are concerned in the present case.”
“The Labour Party simply will not accept this because they’re ideologically incapable of understanding that this straightforward solution is in line with our own, unique, unwritten constitution, unlike other European member states.”
– Sir Bill Cash, 06 July 202
The Dublin Agreement was not even a ‘returns deal’
It must be remembered that the Dublin Agreement was not strictly-speaking a returns deal. It was an agreement for migrants to be returned to the EU member country where they had first requested asylum. In short, France was simply being asked to take back and continue processing these migrants.
For Sir Keir’s alleged ‘one in, one out’ deal with President Macron, it would seem that the UK will be asked to take migrants from France who have some connection with the UK – family or similar. These are therefore people with a chance of being allowed to stay, under the UK’s current lax system and the ever-present threat of being referred to the ECHR.
The majority of the illegal migrants crossing the Channel from France by rubber boats are young men from countries far away, with little or no connection with the UK, and therefore have no genuine reason to be granted asylum. Crucially, although they come from France, they are not the ones whom President Macron will be asking the UK to take.
And then there’s the small matter of the bill
It seems that every time Sir Keir Starmer and David Lammy talk to foreign governments, it ends up costing the UK taxpayer money. So far the taxpayer has seen nothing in return.
Now we will be asked to pay for some extra new ‘elite’ gendarme squad to paddle up and down in the shallows and turn back some of the migrants boats while they are in shallow water, by puncturing the rubber boats themselves. This all comes on top of the £0.5bn the British taxpayer has already given to the French government for – as far as can be ascertained – dramatically increasing the number of illegal migrants making the crossing to the UK this year, once again.
Commenting to GB News, one of Stand for Our Sovereignty’s Vice-Presidents, Claire Bullivant, said:
“None of the costs for all the sovereignty giveaways have been quantified in any detail, but all have been mentioned by the EU as involving UK payments
“They each represent surrenders of sovereignty which are bad enough in themselves, but when the UK has to pay to give away its sovereignty, this is when we really do say:
“‘Enough is enough.’”
“Please do join and support us in this fight.”
– Claire Bullivant, Vice-Chairman, Stand for Our Sovereignty, 06 July 2025
The ‘State Visit’
As Sir Keir rolls out the red carpet for Emmanuel Macron in London on Tuesday, his welcome will not only include a triumphal carriage ride with King Charles, a private tour of the extensive gardens of Buckingham Palace with His Majesty King Charles as his tour guide, but also an address to both House of Parliament.
It seems that even this is not enough for Sir Keir. Discussions are now well-advanced between French and British officials regarding the UK paying for yet more ‘elite’ French squads of Gendarmes. At the weekend the French were careful to ensure TV coverage of Gendames wading in and puncturing migrant boats to prevent them from going any further.
Stand for Our Sovereignty’s other Vice-Chairman was uncompromising:
“Here is a man who – to put it mildly – has hardly been a friend to the United Kingdom. Examples are legion but let’s take one from Sir Keir’s ‘EU Reset’ Summit’, which we refer to as his ‘Summer Sovereignty Sale’.
“Just about the only quantifiable fact that came out of that sorry affair was an eleventh hour demand by Macron to extend the current wholly unacceptable fishing deal for another 12 years. Starmer meekly agreed, and decimated our fishing industry for a period so long that many skippers will have retired before it completes.
“And all for nothing in return. Shameful.
“‘Enough is enough.’”
– Ben Philips, Vice-Chairman, Stand for Our Sovereignty, 05 July 20255
Stand for Our Sovereignty and Facts4EU will be reporting separately on the French police response and in particular the various agreements that have already been reached by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, with talks having starting in November last year.
Before we continue this report….
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Observations
We invite readers to imagine a situation where the roles above are reversed and French are seeing thousands of illegal migrants crossing from England to France.
In this scenario, the British have been content to see so many tens of thousands departing their shores each year that they have not, frankly, put up much résistance. After years of inactivity – or lack of effective activity – by the British, the French insist something must be done. The British government then suggests that perhaps some things could be done, but it will be expensive and the French will have to pay.
“But it’s a British problem, you must pay to solve it,” say the French in a vain hope. Very quickly the French concede and offer to pay for whatever it takes to stop boats setting off from Dover for Calais and Boulogne. “Well, okay,” say the British, “but no guarantees it will work, mind. Let’s see… about half a billion quid should just about cover it to begin with, and we’ll see where we go from there.”
Does this sound remotely plausible? No, we don’t think so either.
Finally – and to be fair to the French – these illegal migrants have passed through many EU countries before reaching the northern shores of France. Ultimately the ownership of the entire problem of illegal immigration like this lies firmly at the door of one Ursula von der Leyen. And a very great deal to a certain fellow countrywoman of hers, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who opened the doors to Europe in 2015.
Yet one more example of the ineptitude of the EU Empire.