I recently lamented the high cost of migrant flights carrying criminal aliens out of the United States, but it appears this is hardly unique to the USA, with the UK also transporting migrants out of the British Isles at a tremendous cost.
Migrant Charter Flights Are Pricey in UK Too
Gone are the days of secretive transports hidden from media scrutiny. As Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer seeks to show his country that Labour is tough on immigration, the UK Home Office produced a video of a recent deportation flight to Albania.
The Daily Telegraph, a venerable London publication dating back to 1855, recently covered the high cost of this flight, which cost an estimated 1 million GBP (about 1.26 million USD) or the equivalent of nearly 28,000 USD per migrant.
The Home Office contracts with private security escorts (3-4 per migrant) who carry leg restraints, waste restraints, and handcuffs just in case an asylum seeker tries to fight back and resist removal. On the flight in question, 47 migrants with three guards each flew on a chartered Airbus A321 aircraft to Albania.
Is it necessary to spend so much money to transport these folks out of a nation?
My problem is not removing illegals from countries in which they do not belong, but the high cost of doing so. The A321 transporting migrants from the UK to Albania had only 47 migrants onboard because each migrant had three guards. But if 3-4 guards surrounding the migrant were necessary on a charter aircraft, why not put them on a Ryanair or Wizzair flight with the same number of guards? If you shackle them and have guards around them, then I doubt they will disturb anyone onboard. If you put the on first and take them off last, it may not be as comfortable as a chartered A321, but it won’t cost $28,000/migrant.
I’m not interested in the “there’s so much government waste, what difference does this make?” line of argument.
I’m just fascinated by the theatrics of these flights and how much they cost…on both sides of the Atlantic.
They often can’t fly commercial because as soon as the deportee acts up during boarding, which they will if they don’t want to leave, then the commercial pilot will refuse to transport them.
They should put a cover over their heads if they act up.
“The U.N. Committee Against Torture has determined that “hooding under special conditions” constitutes both torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. The Committee Against Torture has subsequently reaffirmed that blindfolding constitutes torture. The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture has determined that “blindfolding and hooding should be forbidden.” – just something I found online.
That said – I liked the Rwanda idea, but it never took off….
Surely packing a military transport full of them wouldn’t have a price tag like that?!? Something leads me to believe that this cost is being inflated for political purposes. As in: gee, it’s too expensive to deport people!
This is very cheap!
Britain’s last Conservative government spent almost a billion dollars on its controversial plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.
The policy, which called for sending asylum seekers to the African nation for processing and resettlement, was championed by successive Conservative prime ministers as their flagship plan to tackle irregular migration.
But no asylum seekers were ever deported to Rwanda under the initiative. Four people were put on planes to the central African nation this year, but they were asylum seekers who went voluntarily after being offered £3,000 each.
Yes, a totally stupid plan. I don’t understand the lack of common sense.
Prison ships. UK and US used to have them. Maybe they all haven’t been decommissioned.
I posted this on the previous post about the US Illegal Aliens, but it could be applicable here to depending on how these folks were distributed throughout the UK.
Has anyone bothered to calculate the cost of the previous administration flying illegal aliens all over the interior of the United States (or in this case the UK) and settling them in communities throughout the country (countries) ? Many of those flights are on commercial airlines so there is a cost involved to that too, those airlines get paid for butts in seats so looking at how many of them there have been in the last four years that would be at astronomical cost to the taxpayers as well.
I’ve organised and facilitated multiple removal flights for the UK Home Office, both as dedicated charters and on scheduled services (with/without escorts). There is absolutely no substitute for a dedicated charter from a security perspective when it comes to moving people in larger numbers.
A disruptive removal on a scheduled flight is quite capable of strategically disrupting the flight both before and after departure, notwithstanding anything their escorts can do. While having escorts significantly outnumbering detainees ensures that the escorts will eventually prevail in any altercation, the goal has to be to ensure no altercation occurs to begin with on scheduled flights.
The £22k figure per passenger is not just for the transport, but by the Telegraph’s own admission also includes the cost of the escort contract, the housing of the detainees prior to removal, transport to/from the airports, etc.. Most of these costs would exist even on scheduled flights and in many cases, would be even higher (eg. scheduled flight schedules to return the escorts might require overnight stays at destination, etc.. while charters just bring them back immediately). A typical detainee removal charter flight from the UK to Albania on an A321 would sell for slightly more than £1500 per available seat in most cases, and the rest of the costs cited are not related to the charter itself but rather to the associated processes which would occur even on scheduled flights.
A military plane would be much cheaper.
Why don’t they just use the police and/or military?