More than 50,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel in small boats since Labour took office in July 2024, according to newly released Home Office data. The figures show 474 people arrived on Monday alone in eight boats, bringing the total since the general election to 50,271.
So far this year, 27,029 arrivals have been recorded, a 47% increase compared with the same period in 2024, when the figure stood at 18,342. The number is also 67% higher than at this point in 2023, when 16,170 crossings had been logged.
Education minister Jacqui Smith, a former home secretary, described the milestone as “unacceptable”. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said she would reduce crossings to zero, though she acknowledged it “wouldn’t happen straight away, but it would happen quickly”. She suggested asylum seekers could be held in “camps” rather than hotels, drawing on the model of Nightingale hospitals built during the pandemic.
More than 200 refugee organisations, charities and trade unions have signed an open letter coordinated by the campaign coalition Together With Refugees, calling on political leaders to end “pernicious and insidious currents” of racism and hatred that underpin anti-migrant protests. The letter, backed by groups including Amnesty International UK, Oxfam and Refugee Action, comes amid weeks of protests outside asylum seeker hotels across the country.
