Home Office records 781 arrivals in a day
10 boats arrived on Wednesday
More than 700 migrants arrived in the UK on Wednesday – the highest number for a single day so far this year.
It comes after a Cabinet minister said not every migrant boat can be intercepted in the wake of two boats landing undetected on British shores within two days.
The Home Office recorded 781 arrivals in 10 boats on Wednesday, suggesting an average of 78 people per boat.
This takes the provisional total for Channel crossings for the year so far to 18,565.
This is down 42% on this time last year (32,188), and 26% below the figure at this stage in 2024 (25,165).
Earlier, Education Secretary Lucy Powell said “(you) can’t stop everything all of the time”, the day after 21 people were detained when a boat evaded Border Force to reach the beach of Samphire Hoe in Dover.
It was the second undetected landing in two days, following a dinghy making it to shore at Folkestone on Monday morning.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who has ordered an urgent review by the Border Security Command, said the failure to intercept the two boats was “not acceptable”.
Before Monday, no small boat arrivals to the UK coast without an escort had been officially recorded since September 6, 2025.
Uncontrolled landings are so rare that last year’s incident was the only other one recorded since the Home Office began keeping data in 2023.
It will come as a blow to Border Security Command, which had suggested they were a thing of the past thanks to new surveillance technology and improved resources.
Ms Mahmood said on Wednesday that “even one” uncontrolled landing is “one too many”, and that the urgent review she had ordered would look into “what must be done to ensure it doesn’t happen again”.