Channel migrant toll this year has already hit 20,000

Shock figure is more than double total for 2020

THE number of migrants to have reached Britain across the Channel since the start of the year was poised to top a staggering 20,000 yesterday.

More than 200 people were brought into Dover on Border Force vessels or lifeboats, according to eyewitnesses.

Yesterday’s total – which had not been confirmed by the Home Office last night – could push this year’s running tally past the landmark figure.

Before the latest arrivals, it stood at 19,742, compared with just 8,410 Channel migrants arriving in 2020.

It came as a pressure group claimed the rate of Channel migrants arrested in connection with small boat crossings so far this year had fallen compared with 2020.

Yesterday’s arrivals – after a week-long hiatus due to stormy weather – included a group who attempted to cross the perilous strait in a blow-up dinghy decorated with pictures of parrots and exotic flowers.

Arrivals began just after 8am, with the first group towed into harbour aboard a rigid hulled inflatable boat (RIB), followed by a further 10 less than an hour later. Further arrivals continued throughout the day.

A report published today by Migration Watch UK, which campaigns for tougher border controls, said 46 individuals were arrested by the Home Office’s Immigration Enforcement agency in connection with crossings in small boats from January to September this year. This was equivalent to 0.3 per cent of the 17,086 migrants who arrived in that period, the report added.

By comparison, there were 113 arrests in 2020 – or 1.3 per cent of the year’s arrivals. Alp Mehmet, chairman of Migration Watch UK, said: ‘This is another shocker. As illegal arrivals have shot up, the proportion of arrests has gone the other way. Meanwhile, the British people look on in utter disbelief as one Home Secretary after another fails to get a grip of an ever-worsening situation.’ The record number of arrivals in a day was set in July, with 828.

This is despite Home Secretary Priti Patel pledging to make Channel migrant crossings an ‘infrequent phenomenon’ by spring 2020.

This summer she agreed to hand a further £54million to Emmanuel Macron’s administration in France to step up patrols on their coast.

‘Pushback’ tactics – to stop migrant boats and divert them back to France – have also been authorised by Miss Patel, but have yet to come into force. The French oppose such tactics, claiming they breach international maritime law.

‘Utter disbelief’