Just days ago, Andy Burnham pledged that Labour would be “relentless” in curbing the number of illegal migrants arriving in Britain on small boats.
The Prime Minister admitted that Britons “want to see this issue addressed” as he stood atop the White Cliffs of Dover – from where GB News tracks small boat arrivals every day.
Mr Burnham sits at the head of a party which shot to power two years ago on the promise of stopping the boats and smashing the gangs.
So far, the UK has secured deals with France and Germany in an attempt to rein in people-smuggling networks.
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But the number of illegal migrants arriving on the south coast has increased every year since 2023.
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More than 120,000 people have arrived in that time. That’s enough to fill a city larger than Rochdale, Basildon or Gloucester.
“They see it as an easy route to get to the UK. It’s like almost legal migration for them,” Reform MP Lee Anderson told GB News.
“They abuse the asylum system, tick all the boxes once they get here when they put their claim in… They’re never going to leave this country.”
The number of migrants who have reached the UK after crossing the Channel so far this year is more than 40 per cent lower than at the same point in 2025.
“Clearly, progress is being made,” Mr Burnham said in Dover. “But we’re not complacent… It’s why I am here.”
However, a new trend is emerging in the Home Office’s migration figures which could derail the Government’s promise.
“Mega-dinghies” have been spotted sailing to Kent at an increasing rate.
The number of migrants per vessel is now more than 10 times higher than it was at the start of the small boats crisis.
In 2018, when “asylum seekers” started moving away from lorries and began to cross the Channel over the waves, the average number of passengers stood at seven.
Now, that number is 72.
The People’s Channel was the first to reveal that a boat packed full of 165 illegal migrants arrived in Dover on July 23.
A spokesman for the French lifeboat service called the situation “alarming, unique, and exceptional”.
“We are astonished by the number of people on board this inflatable boat,” the spokesman said, as his colleagues handed out lifejackets to those on board.
The vessels are longer than double-decker buses, and migrants typically pay around £2,000 each for a Channel crossing, meaning a boat carrying 165 passengers could generate a staggering £330,000 in revenue before costs.
One mega-dinghy carrying more than 170 migrants caught fire earlier this week, with British and French rescue vessels called to the scene in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
A maritime security source told GB News it was “miraculous” no one died in the fire.
That boat was later confirmed to be the largest “small” boat to attempt to cross from France.
As the number of migrants per boat climbs higher and higher, the Conservatives have issued a chilling warning: Stopping the boats may be out of Labour’s hands entirely.
The party says the only reason the number of arrivals has decreased is the size of the waves between Britain and France.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp, speaking earlier this week, said the reason the numbers are down “is because of the increased wave height in the Channel… not because of the action the Government’s taken.”
“And we can see that – because as soon as we get a day of calm weather, like last Wednesday, for example, when I was on the beaches in northern France, we had 750 illegal immigrants cross in a single day when the weather was calm.”
If the waves calm down and the trend of mega dinghies continues, the small boats crisis may only get worse.
Labour could yet heed the advice of former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott – the only man to successfully stop the boats.
Last autumn, Mr Abbott told GB News how his border officials put illegal migrants “on unsinkable orange lifeboats with just enough fuel to make it back to Java and said: ‘That’s the way to go. See you later.’
“Once you’re paying the people smugglers for a journey to nowhere, the game is up,” he added, admitting that the tactic has “quite a lot of instructive lessons for Britain right now.”
“The French wouldn’t like it, of course, but frankly, I think it’s an unfriendly act not cracking down on these people smuggling gangs operating out of northern France,” he said.
Responding to the fire earlier this week, a Home Office spokesman said: “This incident underlines the terrible dangers of small boat crossings.
“We continue to work relentlessly with the French and our partners overseas to prevent these perilous journeys.”
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