The number of migrants who illegally crossed the English Channel and the Strait of Pas-de-Calais to reach the United Kingdom already exceeds the total for 2021, according to figures published on Tuesday by the British Ministry of Defence.
At least 28,561 people have thus undertaken this dangerous clandestine crossing at this stage of the year against 28,526 migrants identified at the end of 2021, according to the counts of the ministry. In mid-September last year, 14,500 crossings had been counted, almost half of the current balance.
Crossings that have multiplied since 2018
For Monday alone, the ministry listed 19 boats with 601 migrants on board. August 22 had seen a record with nearly 1,300 arrivals counted in a single day, a peak attributed at the time to optimal weather conditions. These crossings have multiplied since 2018 in the face of the increasing lockdown of the French port of Calais and the Channel Tunnel.
A British parliamentary report estimated that the total could reach 60,000 people this year, despite repeated promises from the previous British Conservative government. London, which has made the subject a priority since Brexit, is paying millions of pounds to France to help it strengthen coastal surveillance and is stepping up measures to toughen up the reception of migrants.
Suella Braverman, the new interior minister in Liz Truss’s government, ardently supports the controversial plan to send illegal migrants back to Rwanda, launched by Priti Patel, who preceded her. This project is currently suspended for a British judicial review.