Number of people crossing Channel on small boats since Labour took office likely to pass 50,000 as Keir Starmer comes under pressure
Date: 2025-08-12T08:02:07.000Z
Title: Test for Labour as figures likely to show over 50,000 migrants have crossed Channel since last July
Content: Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of UK politics.
The number of people who have crossed the Channel on small boats since Labour took office last summer will probably pass 50,000 later today when official figures are released.
Official figures from Monday suggested 49,797 had crossed in small boats from northern France since 5 July 2024.
The prime minister, Keir Starmer, is under considerable pressure to reduce the number of people arriving on small boats across the Channel, with his promise to 'smash the gangs' clearly not working,
The government has set out its plan to close asylum hotels by the end of the parliament and Starmer announced a 'one in, one out' returns deal with France last month.
But there is a rising political urgency around the issue as Nigel Farage's Reform UK party continues to lead polls after attacks on Labour for failing to curb irregular migration.
Farage has more recently been linking sexual offences to immigration as part of his'Britain is lawless' campaign, full of disputed claims.
Kemi Badenoch suggested yesterday that asylum seekers should be housed in camps which could be policed, instead of in hotels, as they currently are. We should get more detail about this proposal later today. Here is what else is on the agenda:
09.30am: New welfare statistics, including the number of universal credit claimants, will be published by the Department for Work and Pensions.
10.45am:The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is likely to face questions from journalists about the latest ONS employment data when she speaks to regional media.
The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, will be speaking to regional media and LBC today.
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It appears that successive governments are able only to formulate key policies in the form of three-word phrases, usually absent of an executive subject. While I welcome the shift in focus represented by the switch from boats to gangs, it is surely evident that this is still only addressing the symptom, not the cause. Most of those arriving in small boats have come from countries either torn by ongoing conflict or ravaged by past conflict. To use the idiom of government, we need to stop the cause, stop the MulhollandGoldsithney, Cornwall Surely the fact that 'More than 50,000 people have crossed Channel in small boats since Labour took power' (12 August) must show that the country is worth living in?Helen KeatingGatehouse of Fleet, Dumfries and Galloway With all the terrible news connected with Gaza, I was gulping to stop tears while reading the final message of the Al Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif ('If these words reach you … Israel has succeeded in killing me': the last words of a journalist killed in Gaza. 11 August).His article touched me as no other. I am not religious, but his love shines through all the pain and terror he has MazumdarGalmpton, Devon When journalists are bombed for reporting what they observe, the only conclusion we can draw is that truth has become the enemy (Global outrage mounts as funeral held for five journalists killed by Israel, 11 August).Pete LavenderWoodthorpe, Nottinghamshire Good Friday is always a non-gardening day in Maria Thun's biodynamic gardening calendar (Letters, 11 August).Stephen BowdenSt Cyr les Colons, France Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
