Why Starmer won’t find migration solutions on his Italy trip

Keir Starmer praised Italy yesterday for its “remarkable progress” in curbing illegal migration by working with authorities in North Africa to prevent would-be asylum-seekers making dangerous sea crossings at the mercy of traffickers. As reported here last week, Italy reported a two-thirds reduction in migrant numbers in July and August compared with the same months last year. What Starmer didn’t acknowledge in talks in Rome with the Italian PM Georgia Meloni was that migration by sea to Greece and Spain in the same period has gone up by roughly the same amount; nor that Meloni’s deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, is on trial for barring a humanitarian vessel carrying 150 refugees from docking in Italy in 2019.

Starmer also praised Italy for “addressing the drivers of migration at source” – presumably hoping not to be challenged on how successful or otherwise Italy has been in ending conflict in South Sudan and the Sahel or limiting the ravages of climate change in sub-Saharan Africa. Note to Downing Street: the sources of migration are not the makeshift camps from which migrants set out in small boats.