Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2016-03-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of whether the diversion of Border Force Cutters to support Frontex’s Operation Triton had an effect on the effectiveness of the Cutter Fleet in preventing the importation of contraband goods to the UK.

James Brokenshire

Border Force has maintained, and will continue to maintain, appropriate capability in UK waters for the period of the ongoing deployments to the Mediterranean. Whilst Border Force does not provide seizure information specific to ports of mode of activity for border security reasons, we can confirm that our maritime assets made record seizures for Class A drugs and detected a significant importation of firearms in UK waters during the calendar year 2015.