'Unsustainable' pressure on RNLI to rescue people crossing Channel

A former RNLI crew member in Kent has described the pressure on lifeboat volunteers called out to rescue migrants crossing the channel as “unsustainable”.

Referring to the rise over the summer in arrivals of asylum seekers from Albania, David Wimble said: “Albania is, I think, probably the straw that’s broken the camel’s back.”

The issue of how to deal with the arrival of small boats continues to divide some in Kent’s coastal communities.

The charity Care4Calais meets migrants at Dungeness with food, water and flipflops – they say they want to counter hostility towards migrants on the beach.

The RNLI crews are almost all volunteers. Their remit is to save lives at sea and they rely on donations.

David Wimble was on the lifeboat crew at Littlestone in Kent for 18 years. He is also a local councillor and works for a local newspaper.

He says he is in touch with RNLI crew members from different stations along the coast.

Mr Wimble, who left the RNLI as crew in 2011, told Sky News: “It’s interfering with normal work the stations would do and the training exercises.

“But more importantly it’s getting harder for crews to actually give up the time to go and do this because most of them have full time jobs and their employers – who are normally very, very understanding – let them drop everything as soon as the pagers go off to go on a job.

“More and more crew members are saying that something is going to have to be done sooner rather than later because it’s not sustainable to keep doing this.”

‘Unprecedented rescue demand’

The RNLI told Sky News the welfare of its volunteers and staff is “a top priority”.

Simon Ling, RNLI head of lifeboats, said: “The very most important thing that I can do in this role is understand the pressures that this type of unprecedented rescue demand is placing upon our people. I’m confident we’re doing that now.

“We are coming up with a whole range of interventions which are specifically aimed at looking after our people, improving our training and improving our equipment.

“The whole concept of volunteers waking up in the middle of the night and leaving their families to go to sea to rescue strangers is a very powerful one and one that we’re very keen to protect.”

Katie Sweetingham, the emergency response team leader in Kent for Care4Calais, tries to meet asylum seekers on the beach at Dungeness if they are brought ashore there by the RNLI.

But this has prompted criticism that the actions of the charity, which also operates in northern France, could in some way encourage or facilitate crossings – which it denies.

Hostility ‘directed in wrong place’

Ms Sweetingham said: “Yes we’re friendly and welcoming but nobody leaves their home and makes such a dangerous journey to get to the UK because somebody is smiling and offering them some dry clothes when they get to the beach.

“To think that that might be the case you don’t fully understand the journeys that people have made to get to the UK. They’re coming to the UK largely because they have family ties to the UK or some connection to the UK with culture or language.

“It’s a difficult issue because lots of the facts are obscured. I think the hostility is being directed in the wrong place.”

Along the coast there are plenty of people with opinions on the small boats situation – but there is also a reluctance to speak out publicly.

However, we arranged to meet up with Lydd resident Tina Goodyer who has lived in Kent for 21 years.

Ms Goodyer – like others we have been in touch with – supports the government’s efforts to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.

She told Sky News she’s lost friends over the issue but said resolutely: “I’ve been called nasty names but it’s like water off a duck’s back, I don’t care. I’m entitled to my opinion and I will have my opinion.

“If they get here they should be sent to Rwanda – wherever – but not here. It shouldn’t be our problem. We’ve got enough problems in this country.”

Referring to asylum seekers being provided with food and accommodation while they wait for their claims to be processed, Ms Goodyer said: “It makes me very angry because we’ve got a lot of elderly people in this country who will have real problems this winter.”

And that’s a sentiment that is creeping into this debate as Britain finds itself in the middle of a cost of living crisis.

Another Kent resident, Andy Lawrence, a butcher, said: “I think more people will start to look at it from that way and it will cast more of a negative light over the issue.”

But he added: “As a father of three myself if I was in their position would I do the same of course.”

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