migrants died off the coast of france on sunday morning after a boat of 60 people capsized. and america is in mourning as former us president jemmy carter has died at the age of 100. >> joe biden praised the one term 39th president as a man of principle, faith and humility, while donald trump stated americans owe him a debt of gratitude. >> king charles and prime minister keir starmer have paid tribute to those who lost their lives in a plane crash in south

korea on sunday. >> tours, trials and triumphs how harry and meghan fared in 2024. >> good morning liverpool extend their lead at the top of the premier league with an irresistible performance at the london stadium in their five zero demolition of west ham united. and there was a big upset at the pdc world darts championship. reigning champion luke humphries is out at the ally pally. >> no low pressure , dominating >> no low pressure, dominating the end of 2024 and taking us into the new year as well. metoffice warnings out for wind, rain and snow. find out all the details coming up in the programme soon. programme 500“. >> programme soon. >> its just gone. >> its just gone. >> 6:00 i'm adam cherry, i'm nana akua and this is gb news breakfast. good morning. french authorities confirmed three deaths yesterday morning following an incident off the coast at sangatte, near calais, in which 45 people were

rescued after struggling to board a small boat bound for the uk. >> border security and asylum minister dame angela eagle said that ruthless criminals were responsible for overloading the boats. >> but who is really to blame? >> but who is really to blame? >> well, we're joined by deputy editor of spiked fraser myers. are the smuggling gangs to blame, or should they have been stopped by now? what do you reckon? >> well, it's the starmer's policy is to smash the gangs, but it looks like the gangs are smashing starmer. unfortunately, i think the issue here is that we all want to see enforcement of the law. we all want to see these criminal gangs brought to boot. but there doesn't seem to be any other policy on the other end that is essentially reducing the incentive to come over. i think, unfortunately, you know, tragedies like this happen because people know that if they come to britain, there is next to zero chance of them being deported, even if they have an asylum claim denied, they will probably just be absorbed into the black economy, even if they commit sometimes horrendous

crimes, they might not be deported, whether on human rights grounds or under our own laws, or due to the echr. so the incentives there are so strong for people to come over illegally. there is essentially there's nothing saying you can't come. and that's something that keir starmer and the labour party are not really interested in dealing with because they see andifs in dealing with because they see and it's true, many people are genuine asylum seekers and refugees, but 100% of them are not. and essentially they treat everyone as that. and they see this dichotomy between, well, it's just the evil smuggling gangs, you know, exploiting people, exploiting helpless people. that may be true in a lot of circumstances, but it's not true in all circumstances. and until that distinction is made more clear, i'm absolutely sick of this, i think. >> i don't know why they haven't got a handle on it. it seems pretty obvious to me those boats would be if i were in charge, those boats would be stopped. if it would require me to get out the echr, then i would do that

if it meant that would happen because people are dying. so what is the solution was rwanda. would rwanda have worked? and should we be leaving the echr to make this? >> i think i think we will have to leave it. i think we do have to leave it. i think we do have to leave it. i think we do have to leave the echr. i think we've got to the situation where, i mean, there's been some incredibly bizarre cases this year where even people who, you know, any sane person would say they should be deported. so recently, there was a congolese man who sexually assaulted his own stepdaughter, but was allowed to stay in the uk on the grounds of his right to a family life. now this is the same family that he is, you know, terrorising and he has to stay in the uk on those on those grounds. so being in the echr, the years of case law creates all these kinds of absurdities that we can't seem to wriggle out of. so that's a big factor. rwanda i'm not so sure about. but we just need to enforce the law as it is. you know, essentially if you come here, you will easily be able to slip away. there are so many cases where people have been told you're not allowed to stay, but they're not actually deported. so there's no, you know, there's nothing to there's nothing to disincentivize people from coming.

>> you must be pretty pessimistic then, because the odds of us leaving the echr are next to zero under this government, or indeed, even with the conservatives under kemi badenoch. so in your view, we're doomed, aren't we? >> a little bit. i mean, it's also possible to ignore the echr, which is what france does quite a lot. they will make their own risk assessment and decide that someone is too dangerous and then deport them anyway, which seems sensible. that's not going to happen under keir starmer, because he seems to have one of the few consistent principles, if you can call it that, that he holds is that he believes in international law, international courts, human rights law above everything else. maybe that might be different under, you know, a conservative administration or, you know, perhaps a different flavour of government that we might not expect. but yes, i think under labouri expect. but yes, i think under labour i don't have any hope of things changing. >> at what point will somebody take this seriously? because i'm looking at it. i'm thinking, this has to stop. even the french must be looking at it and thinking, because there was a moment when we left the eu that there was a let them come across. that attitude was

definitely there. now it's really affecting the french because people are coming to france specifically to now cross the channel. why don't they do something serious about it at their end? >> well, i think it's hard to say how much or little they're doing, but i think but you're right. you know, we do have to take this seriously. we can't just it's really actually quite scary how, you know, every other week it seems like a group of people die. it sort of falls out of the news cycle. you know, these are three human beings have perished in the channel on there are people crossing on christmas day. this is this really is something that governments do have to get a grip with. but i feel like the political class doesn't really care about enforcing our borders. in fact, they probably think it's dirty to enforce britain's borders. the outgoing head of the border force a few years ago says i bloody hate borders. so when you have that in the british political class, i think in the european political class as well, it's going to be very difficult to get a grip on this problem. it's not at the top of their inbox, labour would say. >> the government will say that they do take it very seriously.

admittedly, it wasn't in one of their milestones or or missions or whatever it was. in his recent speech. prime ministers reset speech a couple of months ago, but they do say that smashing the gangs controlling migration is very important, and they're essentially blaming the previous government for not taking it seriously enough. so at least in rhetoric, you you'd have to say that they are taking it seriously. >> i think i think certainly, yes. and keir starmer has come out with in terms of rhetoric. and keir starmer also gave that speech talking about the explosion in legal migration as well. but is that really part of labour's underlying philosophy? i think many people certainly party members. a lot of the mps actually think that this is really about, you know, the answer to this is to have more safe routes, things like that. that's not necessarily a bad thing. you know, people can be generous to genuine asylum seekers. we have been in this country. think about all the hundreds of thousands of people who've come from hong kong , who've come from hong kong, escaping oppression from the ccp or from ukraine during the war. people understand that it's the right thing to do to give asylum

to people in those circumstances. but i think labour seems to see everyone automatically as deserving of a right to come here. and i think that's part of that sort of baked into how they see the world. even if