Migrants: Channel crossings top 20,000 since Starmer became Prime Minister
The Home Secretary is set to make a statement on immigration this afternoon
Last updated 2nd Dec 2024
New figures show more than 20,000 migrants have arrived in the UK after crossing the English Channel since Sir Keir Starmer became Prime Minister.
Home Office data shows 122 people made the journey in two boats yesterday (1 December), meaning 20,110 crossings have now been recorded since the PM took office.
In a speech today the Home Secretary has pledged to "restore order" to the migration system as the number of migrants arriving in the UK.
Yvette Cooper blamed the Tories for failures in the migration system over the past five years as she made a statement in the Commons.
Ms Cooper said many people had "understandably lost faith in the entire system", but sought to blame the Conservatives for a "collapse in controls".
She claimed illegal and legal migration had both "substantially increased" under the Tories, while the asylum backlog "soared" and "enforcement of basic rules fell apart".
"The scale of failure and loss of control has badly undermined trust in the entire system and it will take time to turn things around," the Home Secretary added.
Ms Cooper said Labour would enforce new visa rules put in place when Rishi Sunak was prime minister, and would go further by tackling exploitation in the legal migration system.
She also said the new Border Security Command and a "landmark" deal with Iraq signed last week and intended to crack down on people smuggling would help stem the number of illegal migrants coming to the UK.
The Home Secretary told the Commons: "We have the chance now to turn that around, to fix the chaos, to bring net migration down, to tackle the criminal gangs and prevent dangerous boat crossings, to restore order, control and fair rules properly enforced, not through gimmicks but through hard graft and serious international partnerships."
Yvette Cooper blamed the Tories for failures in the migration system over the past five years as she made a statement in the Commons.
Ms Cooper also announced a detailed breakdown of the costs of the now-scrapped Rwanda deal would be published.
The scheme was aimed at deterring migrants with the threat they could be flown to Kigali, but the Home Secretary said: "The result of that massive commitment of time and money was 84,000 crossed the Channel from the day the deal was signed to the day it was scrapped.
"This so-called deterrent did not result in a single deportation or stop a single boat crossing the Channel."
Downing Street has insisted fresh efforts to tackle Channel crossings are starting to show results, but ministers have so far been reluctant to set any targets.
Shadow home secretary Chris Philp urged ministers to introduce a hard limit on migrant numbers, telling the Commons: "If they are really serious... about reducing net migration as we are, what we really need is a hard cap on the numbers, proposed by the leader of the opposition and I last week."
He added: "Behind all the bluster and all the chat about previous governments, we see her record and her Government's record.
A 64% increase in small boat crossings since the same period before the election, 6,000 extra people in hotels, the asylum backlog up by 11,000, all since the July 4."
There were 50,637 arrivals during Rishi Sunak's 20-month premiership, which began on October 25 2022.
It took around eight-and-a-half months for migrant crossings to top 20,000 after Mr Sunak became prime minister.
His tenure began in the autumn, meaning his first few months in power coincided with winter weather conditions when typically fewer crossings take place.
By contrast, Sir Keir took on the role in the middle of the summer period when crossings are usually at their most numerous and frequent amid spells of better weather.
It took just under five months for migrant crossings to hit 20,000 after he came to power.
Labour sources continued to lay blame at the door of previous Conservative administrations for failing to curb Channel crossings, vowing the new Government will "not repeat those same mistakes, and nor will we let the Tories forget them".
The latest crossings are the first since November 16, marking a 14-day hiatus in activity amid bad weather.
The arrivals take the provisional total for the year so far to 33,684, PA news agency analysis of the figures shows.
Last week the Prime Minister announced a major overhaul of the immigration system and accused the Conservatives of running "a one-nation experiment in open borders" amid concerns over the number of people legally arriving in the UK.
Sir Keir said his Government had inherited an "utter mess" in the Home Office and new Tory leader Kemi Badenoch admitted her party had failed on migration.
The Prime Minister told a Downing Street press conference on Thursday: "Let me say directly to the people watching: where the last government failed you, this one will not. They drove immigration numbers up. We will get them down."
Recent figures showed the cost of the UK's asylum system has risen to £5 billion, the highest level of Home Office spending on record and up by more than a third in a year.
Other data showed 35,651 asylum seekers were being housed in UK hotels at the end of September, up more than 6,000 since the end of June, signalling the first quarterly rise for a year.
Meanwhile Ms Cooper announced a "landmark" deal with Iraq, intended to crack down on people-smuggling and boost border security.
The Prime Minister has put international co-operation with law enforcement agencies in Europe at the heart of his bid to cut the number of arrivals.
He previously said his Government "inherited a very bad position" with record numbers of migrants in the first half of the year "because the entire focus until we had the election was on a gimmick, the Rwanda gimmick, and not enough attention was on taking down the gangs that are running this vile trade".
But "if the boats and the engines aren't available, it obviously makes it much more difficult for these crossings to be made".
His comments came after he vowed to "treat people smugglers like terrorists" as he announced extra cash for his border security command.
Ms Cooper has so far not committed to a target or timeframe for curbing Channel crossings but pledged the Government will "try and make progress as rapidly as possible".
The National Crime Agency has said it is leading around 70 live investigations into organised immigration crime or human trafficking.
Some 50 people have died while trying to cross the Channel this year, according to incidents recorded by the French coastguard in what is considered the deadliest year since the crisis unfolded.
The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has also reported several more migrant deaths believed to be linked to crossing attempts so far in 2024.