The home secretary has questioned whether migrants using small boats to cross the English Channel are "genuine" asylum seekers.
Speaking during a visit to Dover, Sajid Javid said: "A question has to be asked: if you are a genuine asylum seeker why have you not sought asylum in the first safe country that you arrived in?
"Because France is not a country where anyone would argue it is not safe in anyway whatsoever, and if you are genuine then why not seek asylum in your first safe country?"
The home secretary suggested those picked up by the UK authorities could have their asylum requests denied in a bid to prevent others from attempting the same journey.
Mr Javid also defended declaring the situation a "major incident".
He said 539 people had crossed the Straits in 2018, with 80% making the journey in the last three months of the year.
2:18The home secretary said in "almost every case" those crossing went on to seek asylum in the UK.
After talks with high-level officials on Monday, Mr Javid redeployed two cutters from overseas to work alongside HMC Vigilant, which is already operating off the South coast.
He also promised better co-operation between French and UK law enforcement and more work on disrupting efforts to cross the Channel "both directly, but also in more covert ways".
Speaking on Wednesday, Mr Javid said the government wanted to send a strong message to trafficking gangs that they "won't succeed and we won't allow people to succeed".
He added that anyone who made it to the UK would see their asylum request processed "in the normal way".
But, referring to the journey across the world's busiest shipping lane, Mr Javid continued: "It's incredibly dangerous, please do not do that, you are taking your life into your own hands.
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"Also if you do somehow make it to the UK, we will do everything we can to make sure that you are often not successful because we need to break that link, and to break that link means we can save more lives."
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