Shabana Mahmood refused to say that her new asylum crackdown would cause a drop in numbers of illegal migrants entering Britain as she faced a grilling from GB News Political Editor Christopher Hope.

Pressed repeatedly on whether her sweeping asylum reforms would cut small boat crossings, the Home Secretary declined to make any firm commitment, despite admitting she “wants to see them fall”.

Ms Mahmood said: “I want to implement these reforms as quickly as possible… judge me on delivery. I want to get those boat crossings down, but I’m not going to set arbitrary targets.”

Christopher told her GB News viewers would be left “frustrated” by her refusal to say the numbers will drop, saying she could only “hope they will.”

The Home Secretary insisted the public’s cynicism was “justified”, but urged voters to wait for the full package of reforms to be enacted before passing judgement.

“I know it’s a low-trust environment,” she said. “People will say, ‘We’ve heard all this before.’

“Judge us on the totality of the reforms once they’re implemented.”

The Home Secretary argued the Government’s combined changes to family life claims, asylum appeal rules and enforcement powers “can fix this problem and can bring those numbers down”, pointing to recent raids that she said resulted in “a thousand people removed”.

More to follow…