The UK, alongside international partners, is committed to the UN process to develop both a Global Compact on Migration and a Global Compact on Refugees. I believe that the Global Compact on Migration will offer an effective international framework to ensure that migration is safe and orderly and that it balances the rights and responsibilities of both states and migrants. I want to assure you that it is non-legally binding and is primarily focused on complementing existing frameworks to foster stronger international cooperation on migration.

The Compact supports the UK's existing three Global Migration Principles, namely to acknowledge the rights of countries to protect their borders, to improve how we distinguish between refugees and to ensure that refugees claim asylum in the first safe country they reach.

Our participation in the Global Compact will not affect our continued ability to determine our own immigration policy. Indeed, it reaffirms the sovereign right of States to determine their national migration policy. We will continue to control our borders and prevent illegal migration into the UK and crucially, the compact provides support to the Prime Minister's principle that refugees should seek asylum in the first safe country they reach by promoting greater support to hosting countries to protect and support refugees.