More needs to be done to ensure that migrants gathering at Sangatte in northern France are sent back to their country of origin, immigration minister Phil Woolas has said.

Mr Woolas was in Kent to see border controls in operation at Eurotunnel in Folkestone and sign a new agreement between the company and the Border Agency to improve security.

The minister said the Government was trying to resolve the issues about Sangatte, near Calais, and declined to criticise the French authorities for failing to crack down on the problem.

Over recent weeks, several hundred migrants have gathered around Calais in an effort to reach the UK.

The minister conceded more needed to be done to ensure they were dealt with and also admitted tougher action was needed against people traffickers.

He said: “These people are locked out of the UK; they are not queueing to get in. The next stage is to put into place the processes to deport them. We can arrest them but the next question is what do you do with them.

“These people are not genuine asylum seekers because if they were they would have claimed asylum in France. They are economic migrants.”

Dover MP Gwyn Prosser complained that the French were doing too little to remove migrants from Sangatte.

An EU agreement states that it is the responsibility of the first country where migrants arrive to return them to where they came from.

Mr Woolas insisted relationships were good between the UK and France amid some confusion over the Government’s view about whether it was willing to see another camp there.

Figures show that in 2008, there were 28,000 attempts to reach the UK illegally across the Channel by clandestines.