UK Tory party leadership contender, Tom Tugendhat, has apparently just woken up after snoozing through decades of illegal immigration into the UK.

Taking a leaf out of Palmerston's gunboat diplomacy playbook, Tugendhat now wants to send in the Royal Navy to help curtail the cross-channel boat traffic just like the navy was used to patrol the seas to assist with the abolition of slavery centuries ago.

This naval involvement could have been done years ago but apparently Tugendhat is more concerned about Putin 'weaponising' migration in Eastern Europe than the fact that NATO destabilising countries all over the place - Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria come to mind - has been the main trigger for the flood of migrants across the channel and cause of all sorts of migration-related mayhem and crime in mainland Europe.

Tugendhat said: As security minister, I commissioned work to combat the traffickers as part of a strategic, intelligence-led approach.

Right. Work that led nowhere as the problem has only got worse as the Tories kicked the can down the road.

The navy appears to be more focused on detering a mythical seaborne invasion of the UK by Russia than on dealing with the actual seaborne invasion of illegal migrants at the hands of ruthless criminal gangs.

Go figure.

The UK hasn't seen an invasion like this since the Norman Conquest!

Tugendhat should just go back to sleep for another 20 years then maybe when he wakes up again it will all be over.