Thousands of asylum seekers could be forced back across the channel to France under a radical scheme with Paris to curb the flow of illegal immigrants to Britain.
In a sign of pre-election jitters over asylum, Tony Blair will discuss the idea of summary deportations with the French president Jacques Chirac at an Anglo-French summit on Friday.
The initiative follows an Anglo-Italian scheme, launched at the weekend by the prime minister and his Italian counterpart, to crack down on up to 50,000 illegal immigrants through Bosnia and the western Balkans into Europe.
Mr Blair is now hoping to persuade M Chirac to sign up to a "bilateral repatriation" accord which would see illegal cross-channel immigrants being deported back to France immediately. British officials believe that the plan would end any idea among asylum seekers that Britain is a soft touch, an accusation made forcefully by the Conservatives. A Downing Street spokeswoman confirmed last night that the idea would be on the agenda for the Anglo-French summit in Cahors on Friday. "This will be one of about half a dozen ideas on the agenda," the spokeswoman said. "They will look at issues which effect ports in both countries."
The Tories are likely to seize on the Anglo-French scheme as a sign of panic in Downing Street over asylum, an issue which William Hague has exploited over the past year. Downing Street will be hoping that introducing such a tough measure will take the heat out of the asylum issue ahead of the election.
British officials have drawn up the deportation scheme because of fears that the EU's Dublin convention on asylum, which Britain implemented in 1997, has failed to curb illegal immigrants. Under the convention, asylum seekers can be returned to the country which first cleared them to enter the EU. Asylum seekers who cross the channel usually enter the EU from countries such as Italy, which have borders with non-EU states. This makes deportation more difficult.
The French have yet to respond to the British proposal. But Mr Blair will tell Mr Chirac that the scheme would benefit France by discouraging migrants entering France en route to Britain.
The disclosure of the British plan comes amid cross-channel tensions. It is understood that Britain was irritated last month when officials learnt through the media that the French authorities were reducing border security at smaller channel ports such as Dieppe. There are reports that so called "people-smuggling gangs" are using smaller ports to avoid tighter controls in larger ports such as Calais.
The prime minister underlined his determination at the weekend to stem the flow of illegal entrants when he outlined plans with the Italian prime minister, Guiliano Amato, to block the "Sarajevo route" from the Balkans.