RAF 'to fly out asylum seekers'

Tony Blair has been told to consider sending in RAF transport planes and Royal Navy warships as part of a clampdown on illegal immigrants.

The proposals from Downing Street were revealed in a secret "action plan", leaked today which exposes as never before the Government's alarm at the number of would-be asylum seekers fleeing to Britain.

Under the plans, the RAF would be asked to provide transport planes to speed up the return of people en masse refused asylum, enabling them to be deported from Britain more effectively. Royal Navy warships would patrol the Mediterranean to intercept boats carrying illegal immigrants from Africa and the Middle East to Europe.

Countries such as Somalia, Sri Lanka or Turkey which refused to accept the return of their citizens could be threatened with the withdrawal of British and European Union aid, and even with bans on their government officials travelling to Britain.

However, Clare Short's International Development department is understood to be resisting some of the most severe sanctions on the grounds that linking aid with asylum policies could be illegal.

The plans emerged as ministers faced questions over whether they would strike a deal with France to accept up to 1,300 asylum-seekers into Britain in return for the closure of the Red Cross hostel in Sangatte, near Calais.

The new French centre-Right government is understood to have put a deal on the table but no agreement has been reached.

Mr Blair will push forward his attempt to toughen up EU policy on asylum seekers at a summit in Seville next month. The leaked No10 memo, written by Mr Blair's aide Olivia McLeod, says: "It has become clear from the PM's discussions on this issue that concerted action is needed across government if we are to deliver a radical reduction in the numbers."

It is accompanied by a more detailed document drawn up by the Home Office, examining exactly how such a result could be achieved.

The Ministry of Defence has been asked whether it could provide the ships to patrol the Mediterranean, and whether it can lend a hand in bulk removals of asylum seekers whose claims have been rejected.

The plans are certain to provoke fury among refugee groups and some Labour MPs. They demonstrate how ministers have swung to the belief that the situation must be tackled in order to prevent the kind of backlash which has promoted the rise of the far Right in many western European countries.

Other tentative plans disclosed in the leaked document include stationing British officials at airports in Paris and Amsterdam to weed out wouldbe entrants to Britain and drawing up a "white-list" of eastern European countries which are deemed safe to return asylum seekers to, and the possibility of forcing Zimbabweans to obtain a visa before entering Britain.

The documents also identify the need to find new sites for asylum-detention centres, including one near Stansted Airport.

Sangatte is home to 1,300 refugees, many of whom make nightly bids to enter Britain via the Channel Tunnel. Home Secretary David Blunkett has insisted that any move by France to shut the hostel would have to be accompanied by a stepping-up of security at the tunnel and a change in the way France treats refugees.

Any move by Britain to take in some of the Sangatte residents in return for the hostel's closure would prove hugely controversial.

Former Tory home secretary Ann Widdecombe, who campaigned for the closure of Sangatte, said: "This is absolutely monstrous. What a cheek. There is no doubt at all that the people in Sangatte are France's responsibility. We should not enter into this bargain. It is a stitch-up."

Should Britain do a deal with France?