Sir Keir Starmer says 24,000 people who have ‘no right to be here’ have been returned under Labour

Published

4 weeks ago

March 31, 2025

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Sir Keir Starmer has said 24,000 people who “have no right to be here” have been returned since Labour took power as he opened the government’s border security summit.

The prime minister said it was the “highest return rate for eight years”.

Politics latest: UK has been ‘soft touch on migration’, says Starmer

Since Labour took office last July, 29,884 people have been detected crossing the Channel on 542 small boats.

A total of 6,642 people crossed between 1 January to 30 March this year – a 43% increase on the same time last year, when the Conservatives were in power.

Crossings this year passed 5,000 on 21 March, a record compared with the previous seven years since the first crossings in 2018 – and 24% higher than 2024, and 36% higher than 2023.

Interior ministers and law enforcement from more than 40 countries, including the US, Iraq, Vietnam and France, are at the summit at Lancaster House in central London.

Meta, X and TikTok representatives are also there to discuss how to tackle the online promotion of illegal migration.

Sir Keir told the gathering he was “angry” about the scale of illegal immigration around the world as he said it was a “massive driver of global insecurity”.

“The truth is, we can only smash these gangs once and for all if we work together,” he said.

“Because this evil trade, it exploits the cracks between our institutions. It pits nations against one another. It profits from our inability at the political level to come together.”

He said people smuggling should be treated as a global security threat similar to terrorism.

“None of these strategies, as you know, are a silver bullet. I know that,” he told the summit.

“But each of them is another tool, an arsenal that we’re building up to smash the gangs once and for all.”

Analysis: Stop the boats, stop Reform UK

Mhari Aurora

Political correspondent

@MhariAurora

In a speech at the organised immigration crime summit, Sir Keir Starmer pointedly told global delegates there is nothing progressive or compassionate about turning a blind eye to people smuggling.

This is as much a direct challenge to other nations as it is to those in his party who may be uncomfortable with talk of cracking down on illegal migration and making it harder to claim asylum in the UK.

In an effort to front up to the problem, the PM and home secretary both outlined the deep complexities involved in stopping the boats; interrupting supply chains, financial sanctions on gangs and blocking social media content advertising routes to the UK.

Labour’s message? Bear with us, this is harder than it looks.

But, with public patience wearing dangerously thin on small boats crossings after endless promises from Labour and the Conservatives, and with record numbers crossing the Channel – a 43% rise on this time last year – the prime minister knows he has very little time to persuade the public he can deliver.

Senior government sources tell me they are far more worried about Reform UK denting their vote share than they are about the Conservatives – and the PM’s message today indicates just that.

In his speech, Sir Keir twice cited what he called the unfairness of illegal migration: driving down working people’s wages, terms and conditions, and putting valuable public services under strain.

This shift in tone, directly juxtaposing working people with migrants, feels like a subtle yet significant tilt to voters who may be tempted by Nigel Farage’s rhetoric on migration.

However, we may begin to see some Labour MPs fidgeting in their seats as it is sure to make some of them a little uncomfortable.

Sir Keir appears to be marching up the hill the Tories died on. So will this all too familiar hike prove fatal, or will he succeed where Rishi Sunak failed?

And if Sir Keir does succeed and manages to make a significant dent in the number of small boat crossings before the next general election, Reform may not prove to be as lethal an opponent as first thought.

UK has been a ‘soft touch on migration’

The prime minister criticised the previous Conservative government for allowing illegal migration to soar, saying: “For too long the UK has been a soft touch on migration.”

He said a lack of co-ordination between the police and intelligence agencies had been an “open invitation” for people smugglers to send migrants to the UK.

Cooper reveals small boats gang tactics

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper also spoke at the event, where she revealed some of the horrifying tactics used by gangs smuggling people over to the UK in small boats.

She said they place women and children in the middle of the flimsy rigid inflatable boats (RIBs), and when they collapse due to overcrowding, they fold in and crush them.

“All of your countries will have different stories of the way in which the gangs are exploiting people into sexual exploitation, into slave labour, into crime, the way in which the gangs are using new technology,” she said.

She said they were not just using phones and social media to organise crossings, but also drones to spot border patrols.

“It is governments and not gangs who should be deciding who enters our country,” she said.

Sir Keir also hosted a roundtable discussion joined by border security and asylum minister Dame Angela Eagle, Border Security Commander Martin Hewitt and Home Office, Border Force and National Crime Agency officials.

Ministers ‘disappointed’ in small boat numbers

Before the summit, Dame Angela told Wilfred Frost on Sky News Breakfast ministers were “disappointed” in the number of small boat crossings in recent months.

She said one reason was more people were being packed into each boat. She also said smuggler gangs have been allowed to grow “very sophisticated” global networks over many years.

Earlier, Ms Cooper announced £30m funding for “high impact operations” by the Border Security Command (BSC) to tackle supply chains, illicit finances and trafficking routes across Europe, the Western Balkans, Asia and Africa.

An additional £3m will be given to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to increase its capacity to prosecute organised international smugglers and to support the BSC to pursue and arrest those responsible for people smuggling operations.

Politics

SEC drops investigation into PayPal’s stablecoin

Published

3 hours ago

April 30, 2025

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SEC drops investigation into PayPal’s stablecoin

PayPal says the US Securities and Exchange Commission has abandoned its investigation into the payment giant’s US-dollar stablecoin.

PayPal said in an April 29 regulatory filing that the SEC concluded its investigation into PayPal USD (PYUSD) and wouldn’t be taking any action.

The company said it received a subpoena from the SEC’s Division of Enforcement over its stablecoin in November 2023.

“The subpoena requests the production of documents. We are cooperating with the SEC in connection with this request,” PayPal stated at the time.

In its latest filing, the firm said the SEC notified it in February that the agency “was closing this inquiry without enforcement action.”

PayPal has said its stablecoin is 100% redeemable for US dollars and “fully backed” by dollar deposits, including short-term treasuries and cash equivalents.

However, the stablecoin has struggled to gain momentum in a crowded market dominated by rivals Tether and Circle. PYUSD has a market capitalization of just $880 million, less than 1% of Tether’s (USDT) $148.5 billion.

PayPal’s stablecoin has seen better growth this year with a 75% increase in PYUSD circulating supply since the beginning of 2025, according to CoinGecko. It remains down 14% from its peak supply of just over $1 billion in August 2024.

Earnings on PYUSD, Coinbase partnership

That growth could be bolstered by a company announcement on April 23 introducing rewards for PYUSD in a new loyalty offering that will enable US users to earn 3.7% annually for holding the asset on the platform.

Meanwhile, on April 24, PayPal announced a partnership with Coinbase to increase the adoption of PYUSD.

“We are excited to drive new, exciting, and innovative use cases together with Coinbase and the entire cryptocurrency community, putting PYUSD at the center,” said Alex Chriss, PayPal President and CEO.

The payments giant also reported robust first-quarter earnings and the completion of significant share repurchase activities.

The firm beat Wall Street estimates, earning $1.33 per share in the first quarter, topping analyst expectations of $1.16. Revenue rose 1% from a year before to $7.8 billion.

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Politics

BlackRock files to create digital shares tracking one of its money market funds

Published

3 hours ago

April 30, 2025

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BlackRock files to create digital shares tracking one of its money market funds

Asset manager BlackRock has filed to create digital ledger technology shares from one of the firm’s money market funds, which will leverage blockchain technology to maintain a mirror record of share ownership for investors.

The DLT shares will track BlackRock’s BLF Treasury Trust Fund (TTTXX), which may only be purchased from BlackRock Advisors and The Bank of New York Mellon (BNY), the firm said in its April 29 Form N-1A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The money market fund holds over $150 million worth of assets, invested almost entirely in US Treasury bills and cash.

BlackRock said that the shares “are expected to be purchased and held through BNY, which intends to use blockchain technology to maintain a mirror record of share ownership for its customers.”

Unlike the BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), DLT shares won’t be tokenized but will instead be used as a transparency tool to verify ownership.

BlackRock will continue to maintain traditional book-entry records as the official ownership ledger.

BlackRock didn’t propose a ticker or set a management fee for the DLT shares in its filing.

A minimum initial investment of $3 million worth of DLT is required for institutions seeking to purchase the digital shares.

BlackRock follows Fidelity’s March 21 filing to list an Ethereum-based OnChain share class, which seeks to track the Fidelity Treasury Digital Fund (FYHXX) — an $80 million fund consisting almost entirely of US Treasury bills.

While the OnChain share class filing is pending regulatory approval, Fidelity expects it to take effect on May 30.

Wall Street heavyweights continue to explore blockchain use cases

Asset managers have increasingly turned to blockchain to tokenize Treasury bills, bonds and private credit over the past few years.

The treasury tokenization market is currently valued at $6.16 billion, led by BlackRock’s BUIDL at $2.55 billion, while the Franklin Templeton-issued Franklin OnChain US Government Money Fund (BENJI) secures over $700 million worth of real-world assets, according to rwa.xyz.

Ethereum remains the chain of choice for tokenizing treasury assets, and currently houses over $4.55 billion worth, while the Stellar network and Solana round out the top three at $474.9 million and $274.5 million, respectively.

The potential of RWA tokenization has also been championed by BlackRock’s CEO, Larry Fink, who believes the technology could revolutionize investing.

Magazine: Ethereum is destroying the competition in the $16.1T TradFi tokenization race

Politics

US Treasury’s OFAC can’t restore Tornado Cash sanctions, judge rules

Published

4 hours ago

April 30, 2025

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US Treasury’s OFAC can’t restore Tornado Cash sanctions, judge rules

The US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control can’t restore or reimpose sanctions against the crypto mixing service Tornado Cash, a US federal court has ruled.

Austin federal court judge Robert Pitman said in an April 28 judgment that OFAC’s sanctions on Tornado Cash were unlawful and that the agency was “permanently enjoined from enforcing” sanctions.

Tornado Cash users led by Joseph Van Loon had sued the Treasury, arguing that OFAC’s addition of the platform’s smart contract addresses to its Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons (SDN) list was “not in accordance with law.”

OFAC had sanctioned Tornado Cash in August 2022, accusing the protocol of helping launder crypto stolen by the North Korean hacking collective, the Lazarus Group.

The agency dropped the platform from the sanctions list on March 21 and argued that the matter was “moot” after a court ruled in favor of Tornado Cash in January.

This latest amended ruling prevents OFAC from re-sanctioning Tornado Cash or putting it back on the blacklist.

Initially, the court denied a motion for partial summary judgment and granted in favour of the Treasury. However, the Fifth Circuit reversed the decision and instructed the lower court to grant partial summary judgment to the plaintiffs, which led to the sanctions being revoked.

In March, the Treasury argued there was no need for a final court judgment in the lawsuit.

Crypto body petitions White House over Tornado Cash

On April 28, the DeFi Education Fund petitioned White House crypto czar David Sacks to have prosecutors drop charges against Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm.

Storm was charged in August 2023 with helping launder over $1 billion in crypto through the protocol, and his trial is still set for July.

The group said that the Department of Justice was attempting to hold software developers criminally liable for how others use their code, which they argued was “not only absurd in principle, but it sets a precedent that potentially chills all crypto development in the United States.”

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