Nail bars and car washes to see immigration raid blitz, Yvette Cooper says

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Get our free View from Westminster email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Yvette Cooper said 1,000 civil servants had been redeployed from working on the now-abandoned Rwanda scheme to staffing a new “returns and enforcement programme”. Yvette Cooper said the government is ‘drawing up new plans for fast track decisions and returns for safe countries’ Writing in The Sun on Sunday, Ms Cooper added: “We have directed Immigration Enforcement to intensify their operations over the summer, with a focus on employers who are fuelling the trade of criminal gangs by exploiting and facilitating illegal working here in the UK – including in car washes and in the beauty sector. “And we are drawing up new plans for fast track decisions and returns for safe countries.” Labour has made border security one of its top priorities in government and has already taken steps to establish the Border Security Command promised in its manifesto. She said: “We’ve inherited a difficult summer with record numbers of crossings already this year, and we know tackling the problem will take steady hard graft not gimmicks.” For far too long under the Conservatives, we have had just costly chaos - that has to change now Yvette Cooper MP, Home Secretary At least 15,489 people have crossed the Channel in small boats so far this year, with further arrivals on Saturday likely to have pushed that number well above 15,500.