Last month, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood dispatched officials to the Nordic nation to study its border control and asylum policies, which are considered some of the toughest in Europe.

In particular, officials are understood to be looking at Denmark's tighter rules on family reunion and restricting most refugees to a temporary stay in the country.

Ms Mahmood will announce a major shake-up of the UK's immigration system later this month, PA is reporting.

Labour MPs are said to be split on the move.

Some, in so-called Red Wall seats which are seen as vulnerable to challenge from Reform UK, want ministers to go further in the direction Denmark has taken.

But others believe the policies will estrange progressive voters and push the Labour Party too far to the right.

It comes as the government continues to struggle to get immigration under control, with rising numbers of small boat crossings in the Channel over the last few months and a migrant, deported under the UK's returns deal with France, re-entering the country.

Some 648 people crossed the Channel to Britain in nine boats on Friday, according to Home Office figures, bringing the total for the year to 38,223.

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Ms Mahmood wants deterrents in place to stop migrants seeking to enter the country via unauthorised routes.

She also wants to make it easier to remove those who are found to have no right to stay in the UK.

Sources told the PA news agency she was eager to meet her Danish counterpart, Rasmus Stoklund, the country's immigration minister, at the earliest possible convenience.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4, Mr Stoklund likened Danish society to "the hobbits in The Lord Of The Rings" and said people coming to the country who do not contribute positively would not be welcome.

Mr Stoklund said: "We are a small country. We live peacefully and quietly with each other. I guess you could compare us to the hobbits in The Lord Of The Rings."

"We expect people who come here to participate and contribute positively, and if they don't they aren't welcome."

The split in Labour was apparent from public comments by MPs today.

Stoke-on-Trent Central Labour MP Gareth Snell told Radio 4's Today programme that any change bringing "fairness" to an asylum system that his constituents "don't trust" was "worth exploring".

Mike Tapp, a Home Office minister and MP for Dover and Deal, also said: "There is nothing 'Reform-esque' about a firm, fair immigration system that isn't open to abuse.... Those who disagree continue to enable Reform."

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But Nottingham East MP Nadia Whittome, who is a member of the party's Socialist Campaign Group caucus, said: "I think these are policies of the far right. I don't think anyone wants to see a Labour government flirting with them."

Labour backbencher Clive Lewis, the MP for Norwich South, also described the proposals as the "worst of both worlds".

Writing on X, he added: "When a progressive party adopts the logic of its opponents - that migrants are a threat, that order must come before rights, that the state's job is to manage people rather than empower them - it doesn't neutralise the authoritarian right. It normalises it."

Charlie Taylor's assessment comes as it is revealed that two prisoners wrongly released last year are still at large, as are two others believed to have been freed in error in June this year.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, Mr Taylor said the growing number of mistaken early releases was "embarrassing and potentially dangerous".

He also put it down to "an overcomplicated sentencing framework" and described it as "a symptom of a system that is close to breaking point".

He said prison inspections "repeatedly highlight the failure to keep prisons secure, safe and decent, and to provide the sort of activity that will help inmates get work on release".

In his opinion piece, the chief inspector pointed to successive governments' responses to the overcrowding crisis in the system, which put pressure on "junior prison staff who repeatedly had to recalculate every prisoner's release date".

These calculations, he wrote, had been made harder by a series of early-release schemes brought in by successive governments.

The changes, he said, "increase the likelihood of mistakes and in three years the number of releases in error has gone up from around 50 a year to 262".

It comes as ministers face mounting pressure over a series of high-profile manhunts, with Justice Secretary David Lammy admitting on Friday there is a "mountain to climb" to tackle the crisis in the prison system.

Algerian sex offender Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, 24, was arrested on Friday after a police search following his release from HMP Wandsworth in south London last week, which Scotland Yard said officers only found out about on Tuesday.

His recapture was partly down to investigative work by Sky's national correspondent, Tom Parmenter, who tracked Kaddour-Cherif down to Finsbury Park in north London before he handed himself in to police.

Convicted fraudster Billy Smith, 35, handed himself back in on Thursday after being accidentally freed from the same jail on Monday.

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It follows the mistaken release of Hadush Kebatu, who was convicted of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman while living in an asylum hotel. The incidents sparked protests in Epping, Essex.

Prison security checks have been toughened and an independent investigation into mistaken releases launched after the now-deported Ethiopian national was accidentally freed from HMP Chelmsford on 24 October.

A total of 262 inmates were mistakenly let out in the year to March 2025 - a 128% increase on the 115 in the previous 12 months, according to the latest official figures.

Of the total, 90 releases in error were of violent or sex offenders.

Kaddour-Cherif was serving a sentence for trespass with intent to steal, but had previously been convicted for indecent exposure.

He is understood to have overstayed his visitor's visa to the UK after arriving in 2019, and was in the process of being deported.

Asked about the four missing prisoners on Friday, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick said: "The chaos continues. The government keeps putting the British people at risk and is relentlessly failing victims. Does anyone have confidence in David Lammy?"

Mr Lammy said on Friday: "We inherited a prison system in crisis, and I'm appalled at the rate of releases in error this is causing.

"I'm determined to grip this problem, but there is a mountain to climb which cannot be done overnight.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said releases in error "have been increasing for several years and are another symptom of a justice system crisis inherited by this government".

In a statement on Saturday, the ministry said it has introduced "mandatory, stronger prisoner release checks to keep our streets safe and protect the public as well as investing record amounts into our courts - including to improve operational assurance.

"We're also investing billions, reforming sentencing and building the prison places needed to keep the public safe."

Several Algerian men were inside, a few others were outside on the pavement, smoking.

I'd been told the wanted prisoner might be in Finsbury Park, so I ordered a coffee and asked if they'd seen him.

They were happy to tell me that some of them knew Brahim Kaddour-Cherif - the 24-year-old offender who was on the run.

One of the customers revealed to me that he'd actually seen him the night before.

"He wants to hand himself to police," the friend said candidly.

This was the beginning of the end of a high-profile manhunt.

The Algerian convicted sex offender had been at large since 29 October, after he was mistakenly released from HMP Wandsworth in south London.

Within an hour of meeting the friend in the cafe, he had followed myself and camera operator Josh Masters to a nearby street.

We weren't yet filming - he didn't want any attention or fuss surrounding him.

"Follow me, he's in the park," the man told me.

"Follow - but not too close."

We did.

I was in the same park a few weeks ago after fugitive Hadush Kebatu, the Ethiopian sex offender - also wrongly released from prison - was arrested in Finsbury Park.

It was odd to be back in the same spot in such similar circumstances.

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As he led us through the park past joggers, young families and people playing tennis, the man headed for the gates near Finsbury Park station.

All of a sudden, two police officers ran past us.

The Met had received a tip-off from a member of the public.

It was frantic. Undercover officers, uniformed cops, screeching tyres and blaring sirens. We were in the middle of the manhunt.

As they scoured the streets at speed, we walked by some of the Algerian men I'd seen in the cafe.

One man near the group was wearing green tracksuit bottoms, a beanie hat and had glasses on.

"It's him, it's him," one of the other men said to me, gesturing towards him.

The man in the beanie then quickly turned on his heel and walked off.

"It's him, it's him," another guy agreed.

The suspect was walking off while the police were still searching the nearby streets.

Josh and I caught up with him and I asked directly: "Are you Brahim?"

You may have watched the exchange in the Sky News video - he was in denial, evasive and pretended the suspect had pedalled off on a Lime bike.

I can only guess he knew the game was up, but for whatever reason, he was keeping up the lie.

Moments later, one of the bystanders told me "it is him" - with added urgency.

Only the prisoner knows why he then walked up to the nearby police van - officers quickly moved to handcuff him and tell him why he was being arrested.

Over the next 10 minutes, he became agitated. His story changed as I repeatedly asked if he had been the man inside HMP Wandsworth.

Officers needed confirmation too - one quickly pulled out a smartphone and checked an image of the wanted man from one of Sky News' online platforms.

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"It's not my f****** fault, they release me!" he yelled at me.

The search was over, the prisoner cage in the back of the van was opened and he was guided in.

I then spoke to another Algerian man who had tipped off the police - he told me he hated sex offenders and the shame he felt over the whole episode.

The community had done the right thing - there were two tip-offs - one to me, one to the police.

The farce of this manhunt had gone on long enough.

Robert James Purkiss, 38, appeared at Westminster Magistrates' Court on Friday amid efforts by Kenyan prosecutors to bring him to Africa for a trial.

He is accused of murdering 21-year-old Agnes Wanjiru in the town of Nanyuki, Kenya, in 2012. Her body was found in a septic tank two months after she went missing.

A post-mortem examination identified a 2cm stab wound to the lower abdomen and a collapsed lung.

The court heard on Friday that Purkiss allegedly confessed to the killing, telling a colleague that "it was sex that went wrong".

However, his lawyer, David Josse KC, said the former soldier "vehemently" denied the charge and he did not consent to extradition.

Esther Njoki, who is Ms Wanjiru's niece and a spokesperson for the family, said they were "very happy" that proceedings had got under way.

Ms Njoki told Sky News correspondent Charlotte Leeming: "I don't think at any time we have ever thought that he would ever get arrested. But seeing that things now are changing, we are very happy."

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At Friday's hearing, Purkiss was remanded in custody and will appear in court again on 14 November as the proceedings continue.

Ms Njoki told Sky News it had been a "long journey" to get to this point and that sometimes the family had felt like giving up.

But she added: "Seeing Agnes' daughter, who survived her, we had to take up that fight and to fight for her...

"I'm not doing this just for Agnes, but even for other generations to come."

Ms Njoki described her maternal aunt as "lively" and "an extrovert," adding: "We always miss her presence here, because we knew that when she was around, you're safe, and also she used to take care of us. That is the reason why I took up this role, because she took care of me."

She vowed to continue fighting for justice, saying: "This is just the beginning of the long process that is ahead of us...

"We have waited for far too long, 13 years, and we don't know how long the extradition process may take."

Ms Njoki added: "As a family, we are still grieving, especially because of the frustrations that we get, that's what makes us feel sad and even grieve more, because we are here to get peace.

"Because as long as justice has not been served, there's no peace."

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued the Emergency Airworthiness Directive (AD) for McDonnell Douglas MD-11 aircraft after a UPS plane bound for Honolulu crashed on take-off in Louisville on Tuesday evening, killing 14 people. The victims included three pilots.

Delivery firms UPS and FedEx had already grounded their fleets of the planes on Friday "out of an abundance of caution and in the interest of safety".

The FAA said the order, which came following a recommendation by its manufacturer Boeing, was prompted after "an accident where the left-hand engine and pylon detached from the airplane".

A spokesperson for the authority added: "The cause of the detachment is currently under investigation. This condition could result in the loss of continued safe flight and landing.

"The FAA is issuing this AD because the agency has determined the unsafe condition is likely to exist or develop in other products of the same type design.

"The AD prohibits further flight until the airplane is inspected and all applicable corrective actions are performed."

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The MD-11 was first manufactured by McDonnell Douglas in 1988, until its merger with Boeing in 1997.

It was once used by commercial airlines, including Finnair and KLM, as a passenger jet, but was retired in 2014, and is now used only as a freight plane.

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It came as more than 1,300 commercial flights were cancelled in the US on Saturday because of an FAA order, unrelated to the Kentucky crash, to reduce air traffic amid the ongoing government shutdown.

The deadlock in Washington has resulted in shortages of air traffic control staff, who have not been paid for weeks.

Officials have warned that the number of daily cancellations could rise in the coming days unless the political row is resolved.