Signing a deal with Macron to stop migrants will look like the easy bit

Rishi’s remedy

RISHI Sunak’s deal with President Macron to try to stop small-boat migrants is ­welcome as far as it goes.

Of course it rankles to pay the French another £70million, having already shelled out a fortune to convince them to police their own borders.

But it is no small matter to have British officials based in French control rooms, ensuring patrols there are acting rapidly on intelligence and holding back more and more boats.

On its own, though, it sounds a long way off the game-changer voters crave.

The PM must be ready to tackle the root causes of this people-trafficking scandal.

Like the Modern Slavery Act, so poorly worded it gives Albanian criminals an excuse to stay in Britain.

And the Human Rights Act, used by an industry of left-wing lawyers to prevent illegal arrivals ever being deported and ensure asylum claims last years.

Mr Sunak will be howled down by the Left and its broadcasting arm, the BBC.

But these are vital steps. Signing a deal with Macron will look like the easy bit.

Fracking potty

EVEN we did not think the consequences of banning fracking would hit us so fast. But here’s the lunacy of our position now:

The Tories are too terrified of controversy to start shale gas exploration. But with Russian supplies to Europe cut, Norway wants a premium for its gas.

So instead we intend to buy — at still huge expense and FAR greater environmental cost — shale gas which has been fracked in America then liquefied, using vast amounts of extra energy, for shipping across the Atlantic.

We could have our own thriving shale industry, potentially supplying cheap UK gas for decades and creating thousands of jobs. But eco propagandists, NIMBYs and gutless politicians killed it.

Unless we end this lethargic, complacent and blinkered refusal to invest and build, our national decline is inevitable.

Eco delusions

IT’S a staggering statistic. In the last eight years China has pumped more CO2 into the atmosphere than Britain has in the 200 years since the Industrial Revolution.

Here’s another. Since 1990, China’s emissions have soared 330 per cent. Ours have fallen 45 per cent, far more than any major economy.

Our output is down to one per cent of the global total. How do green campaigners get away with painting Britain as the villain?

How can Just Stop Oil still pretend the entire planet is doomed by ANY new oil wells in the North Sea? Why aren’t they tearfully glued to the road outside London’s Chinese Embassy? Or in Beijing?

Some are too brainwashed for facts. For others, their environmental hysteria is a cynical smokescreen.

The real goal is revolution, and socialism.