Britain and France are heading for an immigration showdown

Édouard Philippe, the former French prime minister and likely standard-bearer for Emmanuel Macron’s bloc at next year’s presidential election, has launched a furious broadside at Britain’s handling of the Channel migrant crisis. Speaking at a campaign stop, Philippe denounced the UK’s unforgivably generous response to illegal migrants, which he blamed for creating the pull factors that draw hundreds of thousands of young male drifters from across the developing world toward the beaches of northern France.

If he were elected president, Philippe said he would re-negotiate the Le Touquet Treaty on bilateral cooperation between the two countries, and would insist that the UK covers the full cost of the policing operation. If Britain failed to get its house in order and shut down the pull factors, then he would rip up the agreements and — it was implied — turn a blind eye to the crossings. At the outset, it is hard to find fault with Philippe’s analysis, harshly delivered though it was.

Coming from a politician of the liberal centre-right, it really puts the enormity of the agreement signed between Nigel Farage and Jordan Bardella in September into perspective — not to mention the huge political gamble the gesture represented for the Rassemblement National. The agreement, signed on stage at Reform UK’s party conference, commits Britain to ending the pull factors as soon as Farage’s party takes power; simultaneously, British vessels would be able to return intercepted migrant boats to French ports.

Together, the two measures would overturn the incentive structure of migrants and people smugglers and, it is hoped, put an end to the crossings for good. While the Farage-Bardella agreement was hailed as a huge breakthrough in Britain, many in France were astonished that the RN wasn’t planning to extract far steeper concessions from the UK. Surely, they would at least want to see some evidence of Farage’s new government delivering its agenda, shutting down the asylum system and getting the wheels up on the first deportation flights?

That is what Philippe is now suggesting, and he comes from a political tradition that was previously considered far more conciliatory and open to cooperation than Marine Le Pen’s party. Many of Farage’s British opponents will hope that it is Philippe, or someone like him, whose vision prevails, lest it give Reform UK too easy a run at solving the crisis. After all, the RN’s offer was not extended to other British parties. But despite his tough talk, Philippe’s approach does not represent a departure from the status quo, or offer a pathway out of the crisis.

French centre-right politicians, like their British counterparts, have been making tough-sounding statements about the illegal migration crisis for years now, usually framing it as a failure of enforcement and blaming the other side for the problem. Philippe served as PM under Macron in an administration that promised radicalism yet only oversaw more proceduralism and decline. His muscular rhetoric is a well-honed exercise in signalling against the Left, and an overture toward those wavering Right-wing voters who remain nervous about the RN.

There may be just enough of the latter to push a candidate such as Philippe into second place, and the subsequent run-off ballot in which he would then pivot to liberal voters as he faced off against Le Pen. If he won that contest, it would represent a victory for the status quo. And there is no sign that his approach on migration would then be anything other than the status quo. The truth is that for centre-right politicians on either side of the Channel, the illegal migration story over many years has been something of a political boon, allowing them to point fingers across the water.

The distinction between the mainstream centre-right and centre-left on immigration is largely one of tone, but until recently that has been the only differentiation offered to voters. Liberal conservatives had little incentive in making the problem go away, which is why it hasn’t. But Philippe’s comments may finally represent a twilight of centre-right posturing on the issue. Chris Bayliss is an independent consultant who works on energy infrastructure in the Middle East. baylissbaghdad