The French President ordered pro-refugee groups to “act responsibly” after claims they were inciting Calais migrants to stay in the port town illegally.
He said: “Aid groups have a duty to act responsibly. Charities that encourage these men and women to stay in Calais illegally, or even attempt to cross the Channel to Britain, are taking on a huge amount of responsibility, and will never have the government on their side.”
The 40-year-old president also said he would boost local police resources to make sure they had what they needed to maintain security in the area, while enforcing a “fair” immigration and asylum policy.
Mr Macron was speaking after a visit to Calais yesterday where he was confronted by mayor Natacha Bouchart over another brewing migrant crisis.
She claimed about 400 migrants were in the town, many sleeping rough, with daily attempts to illegally cross the Channel.
Mr Macron said the northern port town could not be used as a “secret entry door” to Britain and “everything is being done” to make illegal crossings impossible from Calais.
The president also addressed allegations of police brutality against migrants, saying that those found guilty of abuse would be punished.
He said: “I cannot let the idea spread that some police forces use physical violence, confiscate personal belongings, wake people up in the middle of the night and use tear gas on water points when meals are being distributed.”
Mr Macron said the government would never allow another ‘Jungle’ camp to spring up in the border town, referring to the squalid shanty town which was home to some 8,000 migrants before being razed to the ground by the French authorities in October 2016.
However the president, who was in Calais to defend his government’s new immigration and asylum policy, has been slammed by critics for his alleged U-turn on immigration.
In an open letter published in Le Monde newspaper yesterday, five former Macron supporters and activists denounced the government’s tough new migration policy, telling the president while they had expected him to be strict, they had not expected him to be inhumane.
Activists, including charity heads Thierry Pech and Lionel Zinsou and economist Jean Pisani-Ferry, wrote: “Your policy contradicts humanism… We expected the new asylum policy to be strict, but we also expected it to be exemplary.
“Instead, we have woken up in a country where [police] steal migrants’ blankets and destroy their tents,” they continued, adding that the new policy was “designed to dissuade migrants from stepping foot on French soil”.
They said: “This logic goes against your humanist values, and does nothing but sow the poisonous seeds of doubt.”
Left-wing MPs also slammed Mr Macron’s new asylum laws, saying they feared humanity was being “eclipsed”.
Parliamentary group Nouvelle Gauche said in a statement: “We are incredibly worried about the consequences of the new immigration policy … and fear that humanity will be eclipsed.”