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An official report into the deaths of at least 27 migrants using a “wholly unsuitable” boat in the English Channel has said the response team in Dover was “insufficient” to react, “foreseeable” problems were not recognised and French and British teams failed to share information properly.

The accident, in November 2021, was the deadliest accident involving a migrant boat trying to cross the Channel. The victims included a pregnant woman and three children.

The report, carried out by the Maritime Accident Investigation Branch, says that 33 passengers had been put on a boat that was “entirely unsuitable for the intended voyage and number of people on board”.

The report also claims that migrants phoning from boats had been told “to claim high levels of distress when in UK waters in the hope of expediting rescue” and that this “had the potential to mask genuine distress”. It also suggests that coastguard personnel may have developed a “mental threshold” of assuming that people were in “less severe peril” than they claimed.

However, relatives of those involved have criticised the report, saying it is vague, ambiguous, lacking in detail and does not hold anybody to account. The government has announced it will hold a separate inquiry into the events surrounding the sinking of the boat, describing it as a full and independent investigation. Transport Secretary Mark Harper said it would offer “families of the victims the clarity they deserve”.

Only two of those on the boat survived. The bodies of the other four have never been found, but they are presumed to be dead, meaning that it is almost certain that 31 people died in the accident on the night of 23-24 November, 2021.

The report is separate from France’s investigation into the disaster, which has now seen preliminary charges laid against five emergency service officials for allegedly failing to assist people in danger. This British report says that “despite extensive requests, the investigation was not granted access to any information held by French authorities”.

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It claims that the British response to the accident was “hampered” by a combination of poor visibility, by a high number of boats that were crossing due to good weather, and by the fact that there was no aircraft available to carry out a surveillance mission across the English Channel.

This meant that the search and rescue response was based on phone calls from migrants on boats as well as information from French authorities. Reconciling the information was “extremely challenging”, the report says, due to the high number of calls, often coming from people on the same boat, and the difficulty in distinguishing one boat from another.

In the end, having established that a boat was sinking with more than 30 people on board, three migrant boats were located in UK waters during the ensuing search, leading to a wrong assumption that the people in peril had already been saved,

A group of people thought to be migrants are rescued off the coast of Folkestone, Kent by a Border Force vessel, as small boat incidents in the Channel continue. Picture date: Saturday November 20, 2021.
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Migrants being rescued in November 2021

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“The investigation found that there was an assumption that the first boat to be found was the stricken craft,” the report concludes. “Events moved on and the plight of the genuinely stricken craft became masked by the increasingly busy task of dealing with crossing events.”

The full report is more than a hundred pages long, and presents a stark account of the accident and the hectic conversations between British authorities, French counterparts and migrants.

During the night, the boat was codenamed “Charlie” by the British and Migrant8 by the French. The report details various calls for help from passengers who call in on their phone, one screaming down the line and saying “I am finished”. Another call is full of shouting and noise, saying that the boat has broken. It says call handlers seemed unsure as to whether they were dealing with another boat in peril – or simply new reports about a vessel they already know about.

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Govt to exit 50 migrant hotels

It details how a helicopter pilot had to be woken up when it was agreed that a fixed-wing aircraft couldn’t fly.

It recounts a call received from a passenger saying that everyone is in the water and that they are “finished”. A message sent to one of the passengers at 3.33am was not delivered, leading the report to conclude that the passengers went into the water between 3.12am and 3.33am.

Other inflatable migrant boats in the area were contacted and rescued, leading to confusion as to whether these were “Charlie” or simply similar vessels.

The report says there have been significant changes in the way authorities respond to small boat crossings since the disaster, and notes a number of reviews. But it does call for greater co-ordination with the French to avoid “confusion and error” and also for UK authorities to improve surveillance.

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How people smuggling works

However, relatives of those involved in the sinking have criticised the report.

Zana Mamand’s brother Twana was on the boat. His body has never been recovered.

“This report is not thorough and it is very ambiguous,” he told Sky News. “The French report is much better – it gave verbatim accounts of what happened, and what was said, and it has led to action. This one is much more vague. There is very little detail of the conversations or the decisions.

“I am not satisfied at all. The British authorities seem to have spent two years on a report that achieves very little. The families want answers – I want to know what effort was put into finding my brother’s body. I have been asking this for two years and I have never received an answer.”

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Mohamed al Fayed: Former royal security head says he warned Royal Family before Diana went on holiday with businessman

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Mohamed al Fayed: Former royal security head says he warned Royal Family before Diana went on holiday with businessman

The former head of royal protection says he warned the Royal Family about Mohamed al Fayed’s reputation before Princess Diana took her sons on holiday with him.

The former Harrods owner, who died last year at the age of 94, was described as a “monster” earlier this week by lawyers representing 37 alleged sexual abuse victims.

The women say he raped and sexually assaulted them while they worked at the luxury department store, prowling the shop floor and “cherry-picking” women to be brought to his executive suite.

Now, Mr Davies says people were aware of the Egyptian businessman’s reputation as far back as the 1990s, and that he raised concerns about him to the Royal Family.

Princess Diana on the quay of the residence of Mohamed Al Fayed in Saint Tropez on 20 July 1997. File pic: AP
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Princess Diana on the quay of the residence of Mohamed al Fayed in Saint Tropez on 20 July 1997. File pic: AP

“This was a man who I would be concerned [about] if a relative of mine was going on holiday with him, let alone the future king and his brother and their mother, Princess Diana,” Dai Davies told Sky News.

Fulham's owner Mohammed Al Fayed during the Barclays Premier League match at Craven Cottage stadium, London. Saturday January 12, 2013.
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Mohamed al Fayed during a match at Craven Cottage stadium in 2013: File pic: PA

In July 1997, a month before she died, Princess Diana went on holiday with Fayed and his wife to their residence in St Tropez.

She took the two young princes with her – a holiday Prince Harry described as “heaven” in his 2023 memoir Spare.

“I was horrified because I was aware of some of the allegations even then that were going around,” said Mr Davies.

“I was aware that he had tried very hard to ingratiate himself with the Royal Family and obviously knowing, as I did, the reputation he was alleged [to have] then, I was concerned, and I took the opportunity to inform the Royal Family.”

Princess Diana, Prince William (right) and Prince Harry (left) in Saint Tropez on 14 July 1997. File pic: AP
Image:
Princess Diana, Prince William (right) and Prince Harry (left) in Saint Tropez on 14 July 1997. File pic: AP

Mr Davies says he was told: “Her Majesty is aware.”

“The rest is history,” he said.

Buckingham Palace told Sky News it had no comment on the allegations.

Fulham ‘deeply disturbed’ by allegations

Fulham FC, a football club that was owned by Fayed between 1997 and 2013, has said it is “deeply troubled” by the dozens of “disturbing” sexual abuse allegations against the businessman.

The Premier League club also said it is “in the process of establishing whether anyone at the club is or has been affected” by this alleged behaviour.

Mohamed al Fayed waves a Fulham scarf in front of supporters in 2012. Pic: Reuters
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Mohamed al Fayed waves a Fulham scarf in front of supporters in 2012. Pic: Reuters

However, Gaute Haugenes, who managed the club’s women’s team between 2001 and 2003, told the BBC extra precautions were taken to protect female players from Fayed.

“We were aware he liked young, blonde girls. So we just made sure that situations couldn’t occur. We protected the players.”

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‘The door was locked behind me’

A former Harrods employee told Sky News she was summoned to Fayed’s apartment when she began working for the department store at 19 years old.

She was told the meeting was a “job review” before “the door was locked behind me”.

“I saw his bedroom door partially open – there were sex toys on view,” she said.

“I felt petrified. I perched myself at the very end of the sofa and then… my boss, the person I worked for, pushed himself onto me.”

Read more: ‘One of the worst cases of corporate sexual exploitation’

Harrods said in a statement on Thursday it was “utterly appalled” by the allegations of abuse and apologised to Fayed’s alleged victims.

The department store has also set up a page on its website inviting former employees to come forward if they have allegations.

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The legal team involved in a civil claim against Harrods for allegedly failing to provide a safe system of work for its employees said they aimed to seek justice for the victims of a “vast web of abuse”.

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Lily Allen says she had her children for ‘all the wrong reasons’

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Lily Allen says she had her children for 'all the wrong reasons'

Lily Allen says she had her children “for all the wrong reasons,” at a “high pressure” point in her career when she felt “overwhelmed”.

The singer and actress had her two daughters, Marnie, 12 and Ethel, 11, with her ex-husband Sam Cooper when she was in her mid-20s.

By the time she became a mum, she’d already had hit singles including Smile and The Fear, released two studio albums and received a Brit Award for best British female solo artist.

Speaking about motherhood on the BBC podcast Miss Me?, which Allen hosts with her long-time friend Miquita Oliver, she said: “I think I had children for all the wrong reasons, really.

“Because I was yearning for unconditional love, which I haven’t felt in my life since I was a child.”

The now 39-year-old star added: “And also, my career was at such high speed, high pressure, and I felt like very overwhelmed by what was happening. I just didn’t get much respite you know?

“And I felt like the only way to stop people hassling me was to say, ‘It’s not about me, actually this is about this other person that’s inside me’.

When asked by Oliver if it worked, Allen says: “Yeah, they did leave me alone. I don’t think I really understood what was happening, what I got myself into.”

The daughter of actor Keith Allen and film producer Alison Owen, she went on to discuss her own childhood.

“My mum, bless her, had children really early as well, and she really struggled. But she doesn’t really talk about the struggle. And so… She inadvertently gaslit me into thinking it was, you know, easy.

“You just sort of throw the kid over your shoulder and you get on with it.

“Her job was very static, and in one place and went to an office and mine wasn’t like that at all. It wasn’t easy. It just wasn’t easy.”

Lily Allen is married to Stranger Things star David Harbour
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Allen is married to Stranger Things star David Harbour

The ‘nasty scars’ caused by absent parents

Allen previously told the Radio Times podcast that while she loves her children, having them “ruined her career”.

She said her decision to prioritise them over her pop career was a decision she made so as not to inflict the “nasty scars” of being an “absent” parent onto them.

She also said the myth of having it all “really annoyed” as it simply was not true.

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Allen, whose younger brother is Game Of Thrones actor Alfie Allen, married Stranger Things star David Harbour in 2020.

Away from her music career, Allen has branched out into acting over the last few years, starring in two plays in London’s West End, and winning a role in Sky drama Dreamland last year.

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Investigation launched into ‘Jail Starmer’ graffiti at MP’s office

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Investigation launched into 'Jail Starmer' graffiti at MP's office

An investigation has been launched after “Jail Starmer” graffiti was daubed on the window of an MP’s office.

The Met Police received an allegation of criminal damage on Saturday in relation to the incident at Clive Efford’s office in Eltham & Chislehurst, South London.

This is a new seat which was won by Labour at the general election, though in 2019 it was notionally Conservative.

On Friday night the window was painted with white graffiti which says “Jail Starmer”.

Sources told Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby that an image of the vandalism has been circulating among Labour MPs’ WhatsApp groups this morning. However, Mr Efford has downplayed the incident.

There have been growing concerns about the safety of politicians in recent years, following the murders of Jo Cox and Sir David Amess.

MPs have described working in an increasingly hostile environment, with experiences ranging from death threats and abuse to attacks on their constituency offices and protests at their homes.

More on Sir Keir Starmer

Ahead of the general election, Tory MP Mike Freer stepped down over concerns for his personal safety, saying an arson attack on his constituency office was the final straw.

The latest incident comes as the Labour Party Conference is about to kick off in Liverpool.

It is the first time in 15 years the event has been held while the party is in government.

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In a statement, the Met Police said: “On Saturday 21, September, police received an allegation of criminal damage to an office building in Westmount Road SE9.

“Graffiti had been daubed on the premises the previous day.

“An investigation has been launched and enquiries are ongoing.

“Anyone with information is asked to call 101 quoting CAD 2672/21Sep.”

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