I enjoyed Roberta Metsola’s attempt at self-promotion in her Talking Point (‘Delivering more secure borders’, April 30). It covered an important issue and, as adviser to successive home affairs ministers from 2005 until 2013, I appreciate fully the huge practical and political difficulties the issue presents.

Never short of a bombastic claim or two, Metsola writes of securing “a new law to manage migration and secure our borders, a law we can all be proud of and that will allay many of our concerns”; of “moving away from management by crisis… taking the tough decisions necessary to deal with the issue long term”. She claims that “against all odds, we have now cleared the final hurdle to having a new force of 10,000 border guards and operational staff in place in the coming years”.

The reality, which Metsola carefully skates over, is that this “new law” is only provisional. It was passed during the last meeting of the current legislative term of this European Parliament and will have to await the induction of the newly-elected Parliament in July. It still needs to be agreed by the Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE) before it comes into force. By then, the priorities of the newly-composed LIBE will almost certainly have changed.

Notwithstanding this, even if agreed by the incoming Committee, the “new” European border force will not be fully operational until 2027 – eight years hence – and the first 5,000 guards will not start being deployed on the ground (subject to “request of member states”) until 2021.

I very much understand Metsola’s attempt at self-promotion. Which politician does not try it on? But I do not like her shortchanging us on the truth about the severe limitations of this “new” European law. Her dissembling does her cause no favours and misleads the public.