Babies and young children are among some of the people who have crossed the Channel in small boats to the UK in the last 24 hours after a three-day hiatus in arrivals.
Arriving in Dover by dinghy and other vessels, large numbers of people made the treacherous journey to the Kent coast after a pause in crossings was recorded between Friday and Sunday. Piles of life vests were pictured at the arrival scene at the dockside.
Almost 5,000 people have made the journey so far in August and more than 21,300 people have arrived in the UK by small boats in 2022, according to provisional government figures.
The danger of navigating busy shipping lanes from France in small boats and dinghies means the weather conditions of August have seen the highest number of crossings in a seven-day period so far this year, with 2,415 people crossing the Channel to the UK between 11 and 17 August. The daily figure of arrivals has topped 600 three times in August and on 1 August, 696 people crossed the Channel in 14 different boats, making it the highest number for crossings on a single day in 2022, according to Ministry of Defence data.
The arrivals come four months after the home secretary, Priti Patel, unveiled plans to send migrants to Rwanda in an attempt to curb Channel crossings. Since the announcement, 16,107 people have arrived in the UK after making the journey.
Despite Patel’s “world-first” agreement with Rwanda, which would receive refugees deemed by the UK to have arrived “illegally” and are therefore inadmissible under new immigration rules, no one has yet been sent to the east African country. The first deportation flight – which was due to take off on 14 June – was grounded amid legal challenges from several asylum seekers, the Public and Commercial Services union and the charities Care4Calais, Detention Action and Asylum Aid, who are challenging the legality of the Home Office policy, with the next court hearings due in September and October.
