Good Morning Britain viewers were left up in arms on Monday morning when former Labour politician Ed Balls joined co-host Kate Garraway in speaking to Dame Angela Eagle about the £100 million of extra funding to an immigration pilot scheme.
Spearheaded by Home Secretary and Balls’ wife Yvette Cooper, the pilot is based on a new “one in, one out” returns agreement between the UK and France, as well as other efforts to crack down on small boat crossings.
The money is believed to also assist in setting up hundreds of new National Crime Agency (NCA) jobs in the government’s bid to gather intelligence to curb the small boat crossings.
Cooper previously lauded the pilot, saying: “This additional funding will strengthen every aspect of our plan and will turbo-charge the ability of our law enforcement agencies to track the gangs and bring them down, working with our partners overseas, and using state-of-the-art technology and equipment.”
Speaking to Eagle on Monday, GMB’s Garraway didn’t seem convinced by the government’s efforts, putting to the minister: “I think a lot of people had sympathy with you when you came into power and said the whole system’s a mess. I think people on all sides agree.
“The trouble is, here we are a year and a bit in and it feels like the situation is getting worse… More crossings, more people at risk, more people coming in and the gangs not being smashed.
“Have you any evidence at all that what you put into place so far is even working just a little bit?” Garraway asked to which Eagle began to respond: “Well, yes. But there’s no quick, easy fix to this -“
Garraway interrupted: “Well, give us the evidence first before you get into the fact it’s going to be slow because that I think people will want to hear.”
Eagle continued: “We inherited a terrible situation with huge backlogs in the system which we’re getting down. We are doing much more work -“
“What backlogs are coming down?” Garraway interjected, leading Eagle to reply: “When we came into government, the previous government had had a 70 percent fall in asylum decision-making so there was just 100,000s of people backed up in the system, not having decisions at all -“
Garraway butted in again to ask for the new figures, to which Eagle claimed: “We’ve got it down to 78,000 for first initial decisions, we’ve had 116 percent increase in asylum decision-making which is getting the system moving again.
“There’s now a backlog developing in the appeals system because we’ve got the system moving again which is why the Home Secretary has been talking about a major reform of the appeals system later this year.”
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Eagle then took aim at the opposition parties: “Remember we still don’t have a border security bill on the statute book, it’s stuck in the House of Lords at the moment and both the Conservatives and Reform are opposing that.
“That would give us more counter-terrorism style powers to disrupt the gangs and prevent the crossings than we have at the moment including the power to download phones of particular use, (and) use that intelligence.
“That’s why the £100 million that I announced today is about creating 300 extra National Crime Agency jobs so that they can do more intelligence gathering and analysis and start to crack down on the gangs.”
Eagle proceeded to laud the government’s work on the pilot, and the collaborative efforts with the French. “We are doing a lot, but there’s not one easy fix to this,” she added.
Balls did eventually chip into the debate, but rather than level his own critique, he used GMB guest and GB News presenter Andrew Pierce’s criticism of the miniscule number of migrants who’ll be involved in the pilot as the basis of his probe.
“It’s a pilot and we’re going to start with low figures so we can get the system working,” Eagle responded.
Balls then weighed in: “You can see why people are frustrated. You’ve been in government a year and now you’re having a pilot. People think we don’t want a pilot, we want you to do it.”
Eagle answered by accusing the Tories of merely “shouting at the French” and that Labour has had to “start from scratch” to mend diplomatic relations. “People will have to be patient,” she commented.
Balls then asked if it was possible to speed up the appeals process before pondering whether investment in ID cards would be the way forward. Eagle was quick to remind Balls that he “legislated” for ID cards when he was in government.
The interview finished off relatively chummy, with Balls calling Eagle “Ange” and joking about confusing her name with Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner.
However, while the trio may have ended the interview in amicable terms, the feel-good factor wasn’t exactly rife among ITV viewers watching at home.
After a clip of the interview was shared on the GMB X page, several viewers flooded the post with their complaints about Eagle’s answers going unchallenged and the manner in which the entire discussion was conducted.
‘Have you any evidence at all that what you’ve put into place is working a little bit?’@kategarraway challenges Home Office Minister Dame Angela Eagle after the Home Office announced £100million of extra funding to tackle people-smuggling gangs. pic.twitter.com/pnA2Hduo47
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) August 4, 2025
“Why is Ed Balls on Good Morning Britain debating his wife’s policies on immigration? Where is Ofcom when you need them?” one X user fumed before a second echoed: “Absolutely pointless interview. Not challenging her answers when it’s literally your job.”
Meanwhile, a third hit out: “@Edballs interviewing someone who works in his wife’s department is ludicrous! What is the point of this charade when he is on??”
“FFS what the heck is @edballs still doing there, he’s a total conflict of interests, he can’t be objective with his mates & missus etc! How to be transparently biased 101,” another raged.
The complaints continued through a fifth who penned: “Ed Balls missus and her incompetence was not mentioned ONCE. Joke of an interview.”
However, it wasn’t just Balls who came under fire for the interview, with Eagle receiving the support of some who felt Garraway was too confrontational.
“Kate interrupted after 7 words then continued all the way though the interview. That is embarrassing presenting,” one person argued. (sic)