Migrant Channel crossings reach 50,000 since Labour took office
Home Office figures showed on Monday 474 migrants arrived by small boat.
Speaking Tuesday morning, government minister Baroness Jacqui Smith described the numbers as an "enormous problem," saying she understood the public's "concern".
Pointing to the government's recently implemented returns deal with France, Minister Smith said the government remained determined to bring the number of crossings down.
"We need to build camps," says Kemi Badenoch in response to the amount of migrants currently arriving in the UK.
There have been 27,029 arrivals so far this year, which is 47% higher than the same point of 2024 when the figure stood at 18,342, and 67% higher than 2023's figure of 16,170.
Responding to the milestone, Leader of the Opposition Kemi Badenoch said if she was in office she could bring the numbers down "very quickly."
She went on to say Labour lacked a deterrence as she called for the return of the previous Conservative government's Rwanda scheme, which would have seen migrants asylum claims processed in the African country with successful applicants being granted leave to remain in Rwanda.
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Scottish Sun
a minute ago
- Scottish Sun
Illegal immigrant who taunted Brits on TikTok fled Germany for ‘soft touch' Britain after travelling from Afghanistan
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) AN illegal migrant who taunted Brits on TikTok from his taxpayer-funded hotel room fled Germany for 'soft-touch' Britain. The Sun told yesterday how he racked up a million views by boasting of crossing the Channel by dinghy, saying: 'Tell your friends to come.' Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 9 The TikTok asylum seeker smirking on dinghy to the UK on Saturday 9 The illegal migrant shared social posts wearing a balaclava 9 He is also seen in photos from his travels to France He posted a step-by-step guide to reaching the UK before hosting a Q&A in the Afghan dialect Pashto. Today we can reveal he swapped stays in Germany and France — two safe countries — to reach 'soft-touch' Britain, one of 434 boat arrivals on Saturday. The man, using the online handle Alexandra420, was moved to a hotel near Heathrow from where he shared eight clips encouraged others to make the journey. It also emerged that months before coming here, he warned Afghan asylum seekers they could be sent home from Germany. READ MORE ON ILLEGAL MIGRANTS STOP THE BOASTS Migrant LIVE STREAMS step by step channel crossing & boasts from hotel Following our investigation, TikTok has taken down his account for promoting people-smuggling. Last night Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp blasted: 'This illegal immigrant had multiple opportunities to claim asylum in other European countries before choosing to come here. 'The Home Office and police should be urgently investigating this man for encouraging others to enter the UK illegally and producing a step-by-step guide showing them how to cross. 'Facilitating illegal immigration is a criminal offence. Enough is enough. "Everyone crossing the Channel illegally by small boat must be removed either to their home country or a safe third country. The Labour government need to get a grip of this crisis.' Mr Philp called for the return of the Rwanda deportation scheme, proposed by the Tories under Boris Johnson and dropped by Sir Keir Starmer on Day One of his premiership. Small boat migrants given taxpayer-funded days out including dinghy trips & £1 Prem tickets as farcical perks exposed Since then, 50,716 migrants have entered on a small boat — including 445 on Tuesday. Removals to Afghanistan have been paused since the Taliban seized control in 2021. It meant the TikTok influencer knew when entering the UK that he would likely not be deported. 9 He poses for a picture at Berlin's Altes Museum 9 Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp says 'enough is enough' Credit: PA He is believed to have stayed in Germany for a substantial time. But he decided to seek better benefits in Britain after posting about a plan by far-right party Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) to deport all illegal migrants. It would have seen the mass return of asylum seekers had the party won February's elections. The current German government is also exploring deporting failed asylum seekers to nations other than their home country. Everyone crossing the Channel illegally by small boat must be removed either to their home country or a safe third country Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp Mocking taxpayers The influencer posted a video of AfD firebrand leader Alice Weidel, in which she claimed: 'The Afghans are a nation that grew up in a war-torn environment. 'We know this fact and we do not deny it. But it does not matter to me where they came from or what conditions they grew up in. 'When they reach Germany, they must respect the laws, customs and culture of this country. young people who appear in German streets in military uniforms…they are clearly from the battlefield, not from the borders of Europe. 'I say this as a warning, not a threat. Learn the civil attitude. Otherwise, perhaps where you came from is more suitable for you.' The asylum seeker wrote of the video: 'Listen to this woman's speech, and indeed, she has spoken what she means. 'This law will be applied to Afghans at the earliest opportunity.' In shared social posts he poses in front of Berlin's Altes Museum, and in a keffiyeh headdress. In another he showed off the city's Alexanderplatz. In a third he sits in front of a bridge in a blue t-shirt, jeans and trainers. He captioned the photo with a location pin emoji, the French flag, and wrote: 'France'. Another photo shows him at an unidentified train station platform wearing a black puffer jacket with cream cargo trousers. We can also reveal he changed his TikTok bio after entering the UK to include a British flag — mocking taxpayers stumping up billions to put up 32,000 people in around 210 migrant hotels. In his 45-minute Q&A session, livestreamed on TikTok on Tuesday, he told his 70,000 followers: 'Finally, I left Germany. Then they moved me into France.' Later, he attempted to make a sarcastic joke by claiming he had not come from Germany — despite admitting it multiple times. A follower asked: 'Brother, have you been to Berlin or not?' The man replied: 'Yes – oh, no, no, I haven't been there, brother. I've never been to Berlin.' He then laughed for several seconds before adding: 'And I've never lived in Germany. Not for one second.' 9 The illegal migrant posted a step-by-step guide to crossing the Channel on a small boat Credit: Tiktok 9 He showed TikTok fans his view from the window of his asylum hotel Credit: Tiktok 9 He also took part in a live Q&A with his followers Appearing to admit he had been rejected for asylum in mainland Europe, he went on: 'What should I do in a country that rejects me? 'I didn't get acceptance, I got nothing. I'm crazy to live there?' Referring to Britain's generous perks, he said: 'There's nothing there. Only here.' Later, in the livestream, he admitted: 'Everything in the story is about acceptance. 'There is no need for my attention there (in Germany) anymore. 'I came from a faraway place, aboard a ship.' Finally, I left Germany. Then they moved me into France After arriving in Dover, he was taken to the processing centre at Manston, Kent, and given standard-issue clothes, some of which he appears to wear in the video. He was then transferred to the Crowne Plaza near Heathrow. The hotel is a stopover for many asylum seekers before switch to more permanent accomodation. Yesterday more migrants came and went from the hotel, which is contracted by the Home Office after previosuly operating as a four-star stopover for holidaymakers and businesspeople. A TikTok spokeswoman said yesterday: 'We take a zero-tolerance approach to content promoting human smuggling, this account has been banned and we remove the vast majority of content before it is even reported. 'Through industry-leading search interventions and close collaboration with the UK National Crime Agency, we work to identify and disrupt organised immigration crime online, adapting our efforts to meet evolving threats.' A Home Office spokeswoman said: 'It is our longstanding policy not to comment on operational matters or individual cases.' 9 The man, using the online handle Alexandra420, was moved to the Crowne Plaza hotel near Heathrow Credit: Dan Charity BBC edit for 'xenophobia' THE BBC was yesterday forced to apologise after a Radio 4 programme branded fears about illegal migrants as 'xenophobic'. A guest singled out Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick for saying he did not want his children 'sharing a neighbourhood with men from backward countries who broke into Britain illegally.' On Thought for the Day, Dr Krish Kandiah said: 'These words echo a fear — fear of the stranger. The technical name is xenophobia.' Jenrick slammed the comments and the BBC edited the show. It said: 'While its reflection on fear in society from a faith perspective is broadly in line with expectations of the programme, some of the language it used went beyond that and we apologise.'
Times
2 minutes ago
- Times
Rachel Reeves risk repeating a mistake if she changes inheritance tax
Whenever a government is desperate to raise funds, there is a good chance it will revisit mad and bad ideas before trying something that is proven to work. As Rachel Reeves stares at the prospect of a black hole in the public finances — ranging from £20 billion to £70 billion, according to various estimates — it is clear that the chancellor cannot dig down the back of the sofa to plug the gap at the next budget. If these estimates are to be believed, dramatic spending cuts or big tax rises will be required to keep within her fiscal rules. Some Labour figures have duly called for a wealth tax, to squeeze the pips out of the country's richest who are already fleeing in rising numbers. Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister, is said to have privately urged Ms Reeves to clamp down on the rich; Lord Kinnock, the former party leader, has done so publicly. Thankfully this unwise idea has been dismissed as 'daft' by Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, which hopefully means it has been discarded. Yet another such bad idea has floated into the public domain: reworking inheritance tax. Reports suggest that Treasury officials have been tasked with examining how assets are being given away before death to reduce liabilities. Under current rules, gifts made seven years or more before someone's death are not captured by inheritance tax. Any gifts handed over after that are taxed at varying rates. The Treasury is said to be examining whether a lifetime cap should be introduced and whether the so-called 'taper rates' on gifts given up to seven years beforehand need to be reworked. It is unclear whether these ideas have yet to reach the chancellor's desk. • Angela Rayner gives Labour a 12-month mission to save itself Were Ms Reeves to pursue changes to inheritance tax, it would represent the apotheosis of the Starmer government's all-pain, no-gain approach to governing. First, changing the rules on inheritance tax would not raise the projected £40 billion required to plug the gap in the public finances. Families would simply find workarounds to avoid strenuous new levies, just as they have done under the present regime. There is a risk that the government would go to great effort to craft new inheritance tax rules, only to find that it fails to deliver what was hoped for and it is back to square one. Second, it is political suicide. There are few issues more likely to incite fury among the electorate than a stricter inheritance tax regime. Swathes of middle England who have carefully accrued capital will punish any party that seeks to take it away. Gordon Brown realised this when mulling over calling an election in 2007, taking fright from the Conservative's plans to raise the inheritance tax threshold to £1 million. And finally, it is morally wrong. Inheritance tax is a levy on those who have worked hard throughout their lives to earn something to pass onto the next generation. The chancellor must draw a line under this speculation, which will prove damaging to her personally the longer it continues. There are better options available, such as tackling the ballooning welfare bill, with spending on disability benefits set to reach £100 billion by the end of the decade. There is also the dire state of productivity in the public sector, which is costing the economy £80 billion a year, as this newspaper reported yesterday. After £40 billion of tax rises in her first budget suffocated economic growth, Ms Reeves would be wise to learn and not repeat the same error.
The Sun
2 minutes ago
- The Sun
UK benefits bill will hit £100bn with one million more on Universal Credit under Labour – I know how to fix it
CHANCELLOR Rachel Reeves is walking Britain into an alligator pit of maxed-out borrowing, higher taxes and stuttering growth. But there is something else now snapping at her high-tax heels — the soaring number of people on out-of-work benefits. 2 2 New figures this week showed that, since Labour took office, there are now over one million MORE people on Universal Credit — that's the size of the population of Birmingham. By 2030, the cost of sickness benefits alone will reach £100billion — more than the entire defence budget. Thousands of people are being written off, their potential wasted. And with hardworking families set to be clobbered by further tax hikes this autumn, Sun readers will rightly ask, 'What is going on?'. As the Work and Pensions Secretary responsible for getting Britain to record employment levels in the 2010s, I know that unless they get welfare under control, taxpayers face a tax bomb overwhelming them this autumn. 'Work instilled pride' To recap, before Covid, my reforms put a hard cap on unemployment benefits and combined them so that jobseekers were always better off in work. We brought in tough new rules and a contract for claimants to sign in return for their benefits, ensuring they looked for a job and took one, with a work coach's help. With this approach, we got 1,600 people into jobs every single day. Workless households fell to their lowest level ever. And half a million more children grew up seeing a parent going out to earn a living — changing their life chances forever. I took the view that work was more than just a paycheck but, importantly, it instilled purpose and pride in your life. Sadly, in 2020, Covid lockdowns saw benefit assessments massively relaxed and sanctions suspended. Meetings were shunted online and never held in person again — a terrible error. Meanwhile, perverse incentives crept into the system, allowing more and more people on to (significantly more generous) sickness benefits. Since then, long-term sickness claims have exploded, rising to almost 3,000 per day. The number of people receiving Personal Independent Payments for anxiety and depression has trebled. Meanwhile, the number of households where no one has ever worked has also risen. Analysis by the think tank I set up, The Centre For Social Justice, found that once all benefits are totted up, you can now receive £2,500 a year more on benefits than someone would receive on the national living wage after tax. In other cases, such as a single parent claiming for anxiety and a child with ADHD, total annual support can reach nearly £37,000 — over £14,000 more than the same person would earn through wages alone. A system designed to protect disabled people in genuine need has morphed into one that too often disincentivises work, traps people in long-term dependency and leaves them without meaningful support to recover. This isn't the whole story. There are, at the extremes, young and old at both edges of the welfare crisis. With almost one million youngsters not in education, employment or training (NEET), the epidemic of school absences could yet see an extra 180,000 pupils join their ranks. And we are leaking talent and experience out of the workforce at an alarming rate, with record numbers of people aged 50-64 on out-of-work benefits. The government must start by addressing the surge in claims since the pandemic, particularly for mental health. But the government has got off to a bad start. The Treasury's push to get quick savings in time for the spring resulted in a rebellion by Labour backbenchers and a U-turn costing £3billion. Yet this ballooning welfare bill has to be tackled, and the CSJ has shown there is a way. First, tighten eligibility for benefits to people with more severe mental health conditions while reinvesting the savings in the support we know genuinely helps people to recover. In-person assessments and benefit sanctions for those failing to seek work must be restored in full. The CSJ shows that this would save over £7billion, a large portion of which should be spent radically expanding NHS therapy and back-to-work help. Second, we need to stop people falling out of work in the first place. 'Young hardest hit' Medicalising the ups and downs of life has resulted in 93 per cent of consultations with a GP ending up with someone signed off altogether rather than keeping them in their job. A proper work and health system should take 'sick notes' provision off GPs, allowing them to devote their time to people, particularly those aged 50–64, needing workplace adjustments. Third, I worry more each day about Britain's young people. The government's National Insurance rises have put up wage costs, making businesses less likely to give them a chance. Young people are the hardest hit by the £25billion jobs tax. Instead, the Chancellor should cut taxes on jobs and introduce a new tax credit for businesses hiring young British NEETS, a CSJ proposal backed by many employers who have called for this. Our post-Covid ballooning welfare bill has to be tackled urgently. But as employment numbers fall in response to higher taxes, Reeves has made it harder to do this. Getting people back to work is critical for us all.
