Dozens of small boat migrants have been intercepted in the English Channel during a busy morning for Border Force and lifeboat teams today.
A group could be seen getting off Border Force boat Defender at the immigration processing centre at the Port of Dover, Kent.
They were all wearing orange life jackets and there appeared to be women as well as men among the group.
Border Force ships Volunteer and Typhoon are anticipated to transport migrants to the shore today after patrolling the Channel earlier. Once their patrol mission concludes, they are expected to sail towards Dover for the migrants’ disembarkation process.
The Dungeness RNLI lifeboat was deployed today and was observed on the Marine Traffic ship tracking website. It navigated to the middle of the Channel before changing its course back towards the Dover area.
In addition to the above vessels, the Hurricane and the MCS Taku are active in the Channel this afternoon. The MCS Taku is responsible for retrieving inflatable dinghies from the water after the migrants have safely disembarked from them.
It comes as arrivals since the Labour Government took charge in July last year topped 30,000.
So far this year 6,796 people have arrived in 123 boats – with increasing numbers of passengers being crammed onto fewer boats.
A group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, from a Border Force vesse
It comes as arrivals since the Labour Government took charge in July last year topped 30,000
In comparison, by this time last year 5,435 people had arrived in 114 boats.
In 2020, the number of people who had crossed by this date was 465; in 2021, it was 1,134; by 2022 that had surged to 4,548 before dropping to 3,770 in 2023; it then rose to 4,644 last year.
Over the weekend, Chris Philp, Shadow Home Secretary, said it was proof the Government had lost control of migration and that its attempts to break up smuggling gangs were failing.
He told MailOnline: ‘These shocking figures show this Labour government has lost control of our borders. When Keir Starmer scrapped the Rwanda plan before it started, he gave up the only deterrent this country had.
‘Crossings are up 31 per cent since the election and 2025 so far has been the worst year ever as a result. Starmer’s claim to ‘smash the gangs’ lies in tatters.’
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said that good weather had enabled the high number of arrivals in March after January and February, when several storms were wreaking havoc on the UK, had lower levels of crossings than previous years.
‘March had much higher levels and the really unacceptable situation that we’re in is because of the way the criminal gangs have taken hold, our border security ends up being dependent on the weather and we cannot continue like this, where the number of calm days affects the number of crossings and affects our border security as well,’ Ms Cooper told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme.
On average, more than 55 people are being stuffed into tiny inflatable dinghies at a time and cast into the Channel – not all of whom will necessarily make it across alive.
The group were all wearing orange life jackets and there appeared to be women as well as men among the group
According to the French-run Office for the Fight against Illicit Trafficking of Migrants, 78 people died trying to reach Britain via small boat last year.
And last month, two migrants died in the space of two days last week. At least eight others have either died or been reported missing in the Channel since the start of 2025, according to the United Nation’s International Organisation for Migration.
A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘We all want to end dangerous small boat crossings, which threaten lives and undermine our border security.
‘The people-smuggling gangs do not care if the vulnerable people they exploit live or die, as long as they pay and we will stop at nothing to dismantle their business models and bring them to justice.
‘That’s why this government has put forward a serious, credible plan to finally restore order to our asylum system, including tougher enforcement powers, ramping up returns to their highest levels for more than half a decade and a major crackdown on illegal working to end the false promise of jobs used by gangs to sell spaces on boats.’
Earlier this month, the Government signed a roadmap with French authorities that aims to disrupt smuggling gangs and deter migrants from making the journey, as well as making it easier to send migrants out of Britain.
It comes as Labour looks set to backtrack on an election promise to scrap the use of hotels to house asylum seekers.
Last week MailOnline reported that an ongoing review of Government spending acknowledged that ‘demand for short-term residential accommodation… is likely to remain over the coming years’.
The figures show Sir Keir Starmer (pictured) has ‘lost control of the borders’, Conservative shadow home secretary Chris Philp said
Attempts to crack down on the people smuggling gangs encouraging the crossings do not appear to be stemming the flow of arrivals (pictured: confiscated outboard motors)
An average of 55 migrants pack themselves onto each inflatable dinghy, according to MailOnline analysis of figures (file image of a packed dinghy in the Channel last August)
The Home Office spent £2.3billion on hotels for asylum seekers in 2022/23 due to ‘pressures on housing supply’ and ‘risks presented by global instability’.
The Home Office is considering setting up ‘return hubs’ in the Balkans for asylum seekers who have had their claims rejected and all options of appeal exhausted to reduce the pressure on Britain.
It would involve payments being made to partner countries for each person removed from the UK.
Similar plans are being looked at in the European Union, with ‘return hubs’ set up outside the EU. The EUFRA, the bloc’s human rights body, said the hubs must not become ‘rights-free zones’.
The Government has shifted its focus away from moving migrants out of Britain and onto dismantling the gangs responsible for enabling their journeys.
Labour scrapped the previous Conservative government’s controversial plan to fly migrants to Rwanda – which had been beset by legal wranglings and challenges.
It signed agreements with Serbia, North Macedonia and Kosovo in a bid to crack down on the people-smuggling gangs who support asylum seekers’ efforts to reach the UK via the English Channel.
The National Crime Agency (NCA) – Britain’s FBI – said earlier this month it had been taking down thousands of pages and profiles on social media that targeted would-be migrants on social media.
And advertisements have been distributed in Albania, Vietnam, and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) that attempt to dissuade people from making small boat crossings.
The ads distributed in the KRI, for instance, warn of a risk of dying at sea, or being forced into slavery by smugglers.
Another campaign targeted at Albanians, entitled Histori Nga Britania (Stories from Britain), sees Albanian migrants share stories about how life in the UK is not as rosy as it seems via social media.
Black and white images show miserable-looking housing estates covered in graffiti and feature accounts from migrants who lament about the cost of living, and the difficulty in securing a right to remain.
One account notes: ‘The moment you come here illegally that’s how life will go on is very hard this state won’t let you become a legal person no matter how hard you try.’
But an internal Foreign Office assessment of the scheme concluded there was ‘limited evidence on the effectiveness’ of what it termed a ‘dissuasive communications approach’.
The Government is trying new strategies to cut migration after ditching the Tories’ Rwanda plan – such as these adverts targeting Kurdish Iraqis which warn: ‘People were lost at sea’
The Foreign Office also funded the Histori Nga Britania (Stories from Britain) campaign targeting Albanians, which sought to paint life in Britain as less than rosy
Smuggling gangs charging them thousands of pounds to help them reach the UK -offering them discounts if they promote their journey on social media in a twisted form of ‘influencing’ others to make the trip.
Last month, three people smugglers were jailed for their part in arranging small boat crossings, earnings huge amounts of cash in the process.
Pistiwan Jameel, Artan Halilaj and Fiorentino Halilaj were jailed for a combined 130 months after being convicted of facilitating illegal migration.
Jameel had been recorded by NCA detectives arranging crossings, moaning about competition pushing his prices down, and bragging he had made at least $2million for his criminal partners.
At the weekend, we reported on the migrants trying to reach Britain by stowing away in caravans and lorries – costing their owners millions in fines when caught.
Around 5,000 ‘clandestine entrants’ were found last year at UK border controls in Calais, Coquelles and Dunkirk, according to a report by the immigration and borders watchdog.
David Bolt noted that the number of detections had fallen dramatically from more than more than 56,000 people in 2016 – before tighter security around ports and the Channel Tunnel prompted people smugglers to change their tactics to favour small boat crossings.
The Home Office’s Clandestine Entrant Civil Penalty Scheme handed out 1,276 fines worth nearly £10million in 2023/24 to drivers who were found with migrants hiding in their vehicles, either in northern France or after crossing into the UK.
