MORE than 1,000 migrants arrived on small boats across the Channel on Shabana Mahmood’s first full day as home secretary, taking total arrivals this year past 30,000.
The Home Office said 1,097 migrants crossed on Saturday after nine days without any arrivals. It was the second-highest daily total this year, after 1,195 on May 31. Crossings have now reached 30,100 — 37 per cent higher than at this point in 2023 and 8 per cent higher than 2022, the record year.
Mahmood called the figures “utterly unacceptable” and said she would consider all options. She pledged the first deportations to France under the new one-in, one-out deal would begin “imminently”, with returns expected later this month.
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Concerns remain that a possible collapse of the French government, with prime minister François Bayrou facing a confidence vote on Monday, could delay returns and a new maritime law allowing French police to intercept boats in the Channel, The Times reported.
The 30,000 mark has been reached earlier this year than any other since records began in 2018. It was reached on September 21 in 2022, October 30 last year, and not at all in 2023.
Mahmood, appointed home secretary after Angela Rayner’s resignation, is expected to outline plans to move asylum seekers from hotels into military sites.
Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said: “Reshuffling ministerial deckchairs does not change the obvious fact Labour has totally lost control of our borders.”
