The next few years will be some of the most dangerous yet the most transformational our country has ever known, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said yesterday in a speech to the think-tank Policy Exchange.
He described his speech as ‘my vision for how Britain can succeed in one of the most dangerous yet transformational eras we’ve ever known’. He singled out Russia, Iran, North Korea, and China as ‘an axis of authoritarian states’. Besides unsettled parts of the world, he spoke of ‘cyber targeting of our democratically elected MPs’ by China; and Russia’s poisoning of the Skripals in Salisbury ‘with chemical weapons’. He went on: “Illegal migration is placing an intolerable strain on our security and our sense of fairness, and unless we act now and act boldly this problem is only going to grow. Extremists are also exploiting these global conflicts to divide us.”
In a wide-ranging speech he lumped together wars in Gaza and Ukraine; ‘criminal gangs’ crossing borders, anti-semitism on university campuses, ‘gender activists hijacking children’s sex education to cancel culture, vocal and aggressive fringe groups are trying to impose their views on the rest of us’, and argued that ‘we must be prepared strategically, economically, with robust plans and greater national resilience, to meet this time of instability’. He spoke also of technological progress notably artificial intelligence, and opportunity, to conclude that ‘our country stands at a crossroads’.
On criminal justice he spoke of ‘huge opportunities to cut crime through technologies like live facial recognition, helping police catch wanted criminals, find missing people, and spend more time on the beat’.
You can read the speech at https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-speech-on-security-13-may-2024.
Labour meanwhile has promised to ‘prioritise strong border security and deliver a properly managed and controlled asylum system’. In a speech last week Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer proposed a ‘Border Security Command’. He said: “An end to the fragmentation between policing, the border force and our intelligence agencies, a collective raising of standards, so that border protection becomes an elite force, not a Cinderella service, an essential frontline defence that communities like this can depend upon.
“To do all that, Border Security Command will bring together hundreds of specialist investigators. The best of the best. From the National Crime Agency, the Border Force, Immigration Enforcement, the Crown Prosecution Service and yes – MI5, all working to a single mission, all freed from the cloying bureaucracy that so often prevents collaboration between different institutions.” He called also for ‘a new partnership with Europol‘, the European Union’s anti-crime agency.
Photo by Mark Rowe: Dover looking east
