- Green leader demands Brits pay hundreds of millions of pounds to make Calais migrants more COMFORTABLE while they wait to take small boats to the UK
Almost half a billion pounds of taxpayers’ money should be used to make Channel migrants more comfortable in France before they try to cross to Britain, the Green Party‘s new leader will say tomorrow.
Zack Polanski will use his provocative Christmas Day message to say £476 million currently being spent on ‘cruelty’ trying to stop them should to go towards a new system based on ‘compassion, kindness and humanity’.
In a video whose release is timed to clash with the King’s Speech he will talk about a three-day visit to Calais he made in the run-up to the festive period.
He will say he witnessed French police, paid for by British taxpayers, slashing tents and confiscating wood used by sheltering migrants to keep warm.
Mr Polanski…will say: ‘This has to stop – the constant political rhetoric and demonisation of people who are just trying to survive in unimaginable living conditions.
‘I don’t believe we’re the country who the media paint us to be. I don’t believe that we’re cruel and heartless. And I don’t believe that if people saw what I’ve seen in recent days, they would turn away.’
Mr Polanski will add that the cash spend on policing in France should instead be spent on ‘a humanitarian and compassionate response’.
But he is likely to face criticism, with more than 41,000 people having now crossed the English Channel in small boats this year, after a flurry of activity in the run up to Christmas.
The latest figures have revealed 803 people made the dangerous journey in 13 dinghies from northern France, starting overnight on Friday and into Saturday.
A further 17 arrived on Monday, bringing the total number of Channel crossings for 2025 to 41,472 people.
Acknowledging his ‘unusual’ Christmas message, he will also call for donations to the Calais Appeal, a group of organisations working to support migrants in the vicinity of the port.
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