In a development that has shocked absolutely no one with a functioning moral compass, the UK Border Force has finally managed to intercept something more dangerous than a stray seagull. Following an undercover BBC investigation that found more guile than a three-card monte dealer in a trench coat, officials today apprehended a suspected people smuggler off the Kent coast. The operation was so meticulously planned that it almost looked like the authorities had accidentally stumbled into competence. Almost.
According to sources – and by sources I mean the same BBC journalists who did the stinging – the suspect was caught red-handed. Or, as the Home Office would say, 'facilitating illegal entry into the United Kingdom.' One must admire the euphemistic dance: it’s not people smuggling, it’s facilitation. Next they’ll call the English Channel a 'spontaneous aquatic migration corridor.'
The breakneck speed of this interception deserves a slow clap. After all, we’re talking about a force that normally can't find its own lifeboats without GPS and a written prayer. Yet here they are, actually doing the one thing we pay them to do: stopping rubber dinghies from becoming the trendy new transport for desperate souls. I ask you, is this not the finest hour of our maritime authorities? Or, as I suspect, a carefully stage-managed bit of news to make us forget the billions wasted on asylum hotels.
Let’s not mince words, dear reader. These smugglers aren’t Errol Flynn characters with panache. They’re brutal profiteers from hell who treat human lives like cargo. The sort of charmers who pack forty people into a ten-foot vessel and tell them ‘luxury cruise.’ So yes, a pat on the back for the Border Force. But a gentle pat like you’d give a toddler who just managed to put his trousers on the right way. Because let’s be honest: this is the first time in months they haven’t been photographed looking bewildered by a wave.
And the BBC sting? Hats off. That’s some top-shelf investigative journalism: buying a trip, filming the handover, then phoning the fuzz. I expect next week they’ll run a piece on how water is wet. But I digress.
At least one less villain is off the street. Though I’d wager my last gimlet that his replacement is already sending out WhatsApp invites. The wheels of tragedy turn quick, and this is but a minor speed bump on the A2 to Brexit Britain.
Now, if only they could intercept the nauseating ubiquity of those blue Home Office signs. But that, my friends, is a sting for another day.
