Mahmood to host Five Eyes meeting on people smuggling

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood will meet her counterparts from the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand in London on Monday to discuss efforts to tackle people smuggling.

The meeting with members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance will be Mahmood’s first major engagement in her new role as home secretary.

The talks come as 1,097 people arrived in the UK in small boats on Saturday – Mahmood’s first full day as home secretary – one of the busiest days on record.

That brought the total number of people arriving in the UK by small boat to more than 30,000 this year, according to Home Office statistics, a number that Mahmood described as “utterly unacceptable”.

The number of people arriving in the UK by small boats this year is up by 37% on last year, according to analysis by the PA news agency.

The meeting with Five Eyes partners comes days after Mahmood was appointed as home secretary, following a cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.

Sir Keir has told his new cabinet to “go up a gear” in delivering on pressing issues for voters, according to Defence Secretary John Healey.

Healey confirmed that the government is looking at expanding the use of military sites to house asylum seekers, as it looks to move people out of so-called asylum hotels.

He confirmed officials were also considering other types of “non-military accommodation”.

Enver Soloman, chief executive of Refugee Council, criticised the plan, saying that “the solution is faster, fairer decisions and safe housing in communities, so refugees can work, study and rebuild their lives”.

US Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem will be among the officials attending the talks in London, which Mahmood said will also address ways to tackle child sexual abuse online and the spread of deadly synthetic opioids.