PA MediaPeople, believed to be migrants, on a beach in Dunkirk before attempting a small boats crossing Conservative shadow home secretary Chris Philp has accused the Attorney General, Lord Hermer, of a "disgraceful slur" when he said some right-wing politicians' policies on small boats amounted to letting "people drown in the water".
In an interview with the BBC's Political Thinking podcast, Lord Hermer said the Labour government had been able to reduce the number of people making the dangerous journey through international cooperation and agreements.
He argued that such deals would fall through if the UK left the European Convention on Human Rights, as proposed by the Conservatives and Reform UK.
"So what Reform and the Tories have to answer is: Well what would you do?" he said.
When it was put to him that the parties would "send them somewhere else", Lord Hermer replied: "Well I think what they mean by that is let people drown in the water and that is not a British way to deal with it."
Asked if he believed that Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch wanted to let people drown in the English Channel, Lord Hermer replied: "No, no, I think if you hear some of the voices, even to the right of Kemi Badenoch, some of the language and some of rhetoric is deeply, deeply concerning, the kind of disregard for the humanity of people."
In response, Philp said: "It is a disgraceful slur to suggest that those wanting to end illegal small boat immigration are prepared to see migrants drown.
"The fact is that human rights lawyers like Hermer and [Sir Keir] Starmer are part of the problem - because they think the often tenuous human rights claims of illegal immigrants are more important than protecting our border."
He said small boat crossings had increased under Sir Keir's government and added: "Hermer has the cheek to suggest this is acceptable.
"We need to leave the European Convention on Human Rights so that all illegal immigrants can be deported within a week of arrival - then the crossings would soon stop.
"But Hermer and his Labour allies are not willing to do this so the illegal immigrants will continue to flood in under Labour."
A spokesperson for Lord Hermer responded to Philp, saying: "The Attorney General repeatedly argues that this government has a steely determination to tackle illegal immigration, and this is not in tension with upholding our human rights obligations.
"The Attorney also makes clear his concern about how some on the hard-right are using dehumanising rhetoric about migrants, and that this is not the British way."
Since 2018, more than 200,000 people have reached the UK by crossing the English Channel in a small boat.
The highest year for crossings was 2022, followed by 2025, when more than 40,000 people arrived by small boat.
So far this year, the numbers are down 38% on the same period in 2025, with around 9,000 arriving since January.
The Conservatives and Reform UK have argued that leaving the European Convention on Human Rights would make it easier to remove people arriving illegally in the UK by small boats.
The Labour government has rejected this approach and instead sought to change how the convention works in practice.
Last year European countries agreed to negotiate how the treaty is interpreted to make it easier to deport illegal migrants.
Reform UK has also pledged to review all asylum claims from the last five years if it wins power.
Lord Hermer, a human rights lawyer and close ally of the prime minister, told the BBC that it was "only through international cooperation that we're going to be able to deal effectively with small boats - that requires our [ECHR] membership".
"People are coming across to this country from France, from Belgium, they're travelling through Greece, they're taking boat parts through Germany.
"They're not coming here because we are members of the Council of Europe and have signed up to the European Convention of Human Rights.
"They're travelling from countries that are also signatories and strong supporters of it."
He said that since coming to power the government has signed two deals with France on setting up a 'one in one out' arrangement and another aimed at allowing French police to intervene more forcefully to stop small boats leaving the northern coast of France.
