Good news! To celebrate the newly strengthened bond between Britain and France, the Bayeux Tapestry looks set to return to England. In exchange, certain archaeological relics could be on their way to France. No, this does not include PM Keir Starmer—the Sutton Hoo collection from two Anglo-Saxon cemeteries will be making its way across the English Channel to help the two European neighbours put all that Brexit unpleasantness behind them.
Talk of medieval antiquities is a fitting reminder that Starmer and President Emmanuel Macron look like yesterday’s men. Both are under huge pressure from a resentful public, bungling challenges from populists and Islamists, while failing to set out and implement policies in line with voters’ demands.
A case in point is the move to a ‘one in, one out’ policy on migration that nobody wants. Under the terms of the deal, an asylum seeker in France with a family connection to the UK could be exchanged for an individual who entered Britain illegally, most likely on a ‘small boat’ Channel crossing. Labour wanted this in place in time for its first anniversary in office, while Macron prevailed in his preference to announce the policy as part of his state visit to London and Windsor. Some of France’s European Union partners fear that the migrants exchanged with the UK might end up back inside their borders.
The proposal, due for debate on the final day of Macron’s state visit, demonstrates just how insulated from reality both leaders are. The French president claims that the two countries have a shared responsibility to address what he calls ‘irregular migration.’ Starmer, who scrapped the ‘Rwanda plan‘ of his predecessor, hapless Rishi Sunak, hopes the new tactics will act as a deterrent to illegal Channel crossings. Within their respective technocratic bubbles, both welcome the broad sweep of ‘one in, one out’ as a suitable administrative fix.
Yet firstly, this misreads the mood of the migrants, who have paid handsomely—often incurring debts—to get to English shores. Disposing of identity documents along the way, they have been briefed by human traffickers to claim asylum on arrival. They might also have witnessed the gangsters transporting them, battling African migrants trying to hitch a free ride on the already overcrowded vessels heading out to sea. The idea of detention under UK Home Office supervision, while a suitable counterpart in France is found for exchange, is unlikely to deter them.
Secondly, angry British voters can do the maths. Under the leaked terms of the scheme, 50 such migrants a week would head east from a hotel to M. Macron’s care. Fifty people is not too different to the number of passengers on a single ‘small boat’ which, in total, are known to have brought in more than 40,000 people since a Labour government was voted in more than a year ago, or 20,000 in the half-year to June 2025. These grim tallies mean that, in short, ‘one in one out’ is irrelevant in terms of controlling the numbers, as well as being unlikely to act as any sort of deterrent.
In the real world, the lame-duck administrations of Starmer and Macron are just about capable of organising ‘one in, one out’ deals on medieval artefacts, but are clueless in the face of global challenges. It can only be a matter of time before British and French voters adopt a ‘two out’ policy of their own.
