Mahmood’s detention centre plan to stop migrants crossing Channel from France hit with legal challenge
Part of a new UK-funded French immigration detention center is facing being shelved due to a legal challenge, according to reports.
The centre, which the French first committed to build in 2023 under Rishi Sunak’s government, is under construction and is expected to be operational by the end of this year.
The building, which has space for 140 people, will be used to house immigrants detained by French police before crossing the English Channel. According to the agreement, small boat migrants will be detained in the region until they are repatriated to their home countries or another EU member state.
But the completion of the facility has been jeopardized by an environmental group called the Flemish-Artois Coastal Environmental Defense Council, known as ADELFA. BBC reported.
The group objected to the decision to grant permission to build the detention center last November, saying it breached local planning rules. The objection was rejected and ADELFA appealed to the Lille Administrative Court.
Immigrants can be detained for a maximum of 90 days. France currently has four UK-run detention centers (Calais tourist, Coquelles transport, Coquelles tourist and Dunkirk) that hold immigrants for up to 24 hours.
According to charity workers who support immigrants sheltered here, the information of people taken to these areas is taken, their fingerprints are processed and then they are released.
The additional detention center was funded with part of a £160 million fund that Britain will pay France for new tactics to stop the number of people traveling across the Channel.
Britain and France agreed a £662m deal for the next three years last month. Britain will pay around £501 million for more officers and more surveillance technology along the coast of northern France, despite a previous funding increase failing to reduce the number of Channel crossings.
Between January 1 and May 25 this year, 8,565 people crossed the Channel by small boat from France; This figure decreased by 37 percent compared to the same period in 2025.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs was contacted for comment.
