Army officer takes charge of command launched in bid to tackle Channel crossings

A senior retiring army officer is to take charge of the Government’s new unit being launched in a bid to crack down on Channel crossings.

Major General Duncan Capps, a former head of the army training college at Sandhurst, will take on the role of clandestine Channel threat commander from Daniel O’Mahoney who is standing down after two-and-a-half-years, it is understood.

Considered by officials to be an extremely experienced leader, Mr Capps, who retires as an army officer this month, will head up the “small boats operational command” unveiled by the Prime Minister earlier this week as part of a raft of new measures in a bid to grip the migrant crisis.

The “permanent, unified” unit will bring together military and civilian staff alongside the National Crime Agency (NCA) to coordinate “intelligence, interception, processing, and enforcement”, Rishi Sunak told MPs.

Mr Capps will be the interim leader of the command, with a new permanent director appointed in the new year, the Home Office said.

The move means control of the operation is being handed back to the Home Office at the end of January after then prime minister Boris Johnson put the Ministry of Defence (MoD) in charge in April.

But officials – who are keen to stress the shift will mark a fundamentally different approach to tackling crossings – anticipate some ongoing military support will still be needed.

Some 730 additional Border Force staff will be hired to work as part of the command, although some may be seconded from places like the MoD and NCA.

Around 100 of those will work in the London headquarters – split across the Home Office and the NCA – while the remainder will be frontline staff, based mostly in Dover but also in Manston in Kent.

But it could take up to a year for the teams to be in post as a result of the time the recruitment process and training will take.

Former Royal Marine Mr O’Mahoney’s role was considered “vital” by the former home secretary Priti Patel to crack down on crossings and make the route from France to the UK “unviable” when she hired him in August 2020.

An average of just 12 migrants were making the crossing per boat when he started but this has since risen to 47 in October this year, officials said.

At that time, 400 people making the journey in one day was seen as major influx of arrivals whereas now that figure is considered business as usual, with daily numbers now sometimes surpassing 1,000.

The Home Office has also hired a director to oversee improvements at the Manston migrant processing centre.