It is good news that today a man suspected of being a significant supplier of small boat equipment has been arrested. Criminal gangs have been getting away with this for far too long. I want to thank the UK National Crime Agency along with their Dutch and Belgian counterparts, for all their hard work and their crucial role in this investigation.
It's exactly what we want to see, and it shows that our approach of working with international partners to smash the people smuggling gangs is bearing fruit. In just over four months since the election, we've rapidly set up a new Border Security Command, bringing together key agencies to disrupt people smuggling gangs.
And last week, I announced new funding which will mean up to 150 million pounds over the next two years to support the important work that has led to the arrest today. That includes recruiting 100 more specialist investigators and intelligence officers for the UK National Crime agency and advanced data exploitation improvements for the NCA to boost our collaboration with European partners.
We've also doubled the number of UK officers in Europol and signed find new agreements with Slovenia, Serbia and Slovakia. I'll continue to work closely with my European counterparts, particularly in Italy, Germany, France, to enhance that collaboration, because clearly it is already having an impact.