Record Migrant Boat Crossings in 2025

 

As of July 31, 2025, the UK has recorded its highest-ever number of migrant arrivals by small boat this early in the year despite political promises to the contrary:

Key Figures

  • Total arrivals: 25,436 migrants

  • Boats used: 432 vessels

  • Single-day peak: 898 migrants in 13 boats on July 30

  • Average per boat: 59 people, with some days reaching 75 per boat

Year-on-Year Comparison

YearDate 25,000 Milestone ReachedTotal by Year-End
2025July 31Projected to exceed 50,000
2024September 22~45,000
2023October 2~45,774
2022August 2745,774

This marks a 51% increase over 2024 and 73% over 2023 at the same point in the year.

200k migrants would be a city x2 the size of Canterbury.

Contributing Factors

  • Benign weather: Calm seas and warm conditions have enabled more crossings

  • Smuggler tactics: Use of “taxi boats” and longer launch routes to evade detection

  • Border enforcement gaps: French patrols criticized for lax response eg not seizing/puncturing boats on beaches or shallow water; UK Border Force and Royal Navy overwhelmed and RNLI volunteers having to risk their lives in the East Kent Channel the world's busiest shipping lane

  • Policy shifts: Scrapping (fortunately) of Rwanda scheme and slow rollout of “one-in, one-out” deal with France; no sign of legal routes with Lille and Arras processing

  • No Most Wanted list of traffik gangs suggests policing fail

Political Response

  • Keir Starmer’s government faces mounting pressure, with critics calling it a “national emergency”

  • Labour approval falls to just 22%: its lowest ever(!) level just a year from the 2024 landslide election and Farageist Reform rise as a protest vote and Tory collapse/defections

  • New Border Security Command and financial sanctions on smugglers have been announced

  • NCA seizure: 25 inflatable boats intercepted in Bulgaria(!), the largest single haul this year

  • Public protests and riots at 4* soft-touch hotels for migrants eg in Canary Wharf and uncontrolled immigration and lack of legal routes

Time for East Kent Gurkha auxiliary patrols of French beaches?

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