France is to double the capacity of its migrant detention centres to 3,000 as its parliament prepares to debate tougher immigration rules next month, reports The Times.
Gérald Darmanin, the interior minister, said new centres for illegal entrants awaiting deportation would open in the next four years in 11 cities including Nice, near the Italian border where many migrants enter France. Others are planned in Dunkirk, near Calais, Dijon, Aix-en-Provence and elsewhere.
“We are going to double the number of places in detention centres from nearly 1,500 to 3,000,” Darmanin told the newspaper Le Parisien. “Each centre will be able to hold about 100 people.”
Britain has seven immigration detention facilities that can hold a total of 2,192 people.
Last year nearly 16,000 migrants were detained in mainland France and more than 27,000 in its overseas territories, such as Mayotte, off the east African coast. In 2021 Britain detained about 24,500 migrants.