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The number of people arriving in the UK by small boat via the Channel fell by more than a third in 2023, marking the first year-on-year decline since records began in 2018, according to government figures.
The provisional data showed that 29,437 migrants arrived by this route, marking a decrease of 36 per cent on the previous year, when the figure stood at 45,774. However, levels were still higher than the total recorded in 2021, when 28,526 people made the crossing.
The tally confirmed that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak fell far short of his pledge to “stop the boats” altogether, one of his five priorities for 2023. He admitted in December that there was “no firm date” for fulfilling his vow.
The drop in numbers was attributed in part to a successful returns deal agreed with Albania, while bad weather was also identified as a factor.
Lucy Moreton, professional officer of the ISU trade union that represents border staff, told the BBC the number of small boat arrivals in 2023 was “unusually low” and the total was expected to rise in the year ahead.
She said “particularly high winds” had been among “confounding factors” that had meant there were a large number of days when it was not easy to launch small boats in the past year.
“But we have also had much larger boats, much more seaworthy boats, so the planning assumption is that this is a glitch,” Moreton said.
She added: “Will we see the peak that we saw in 2022? Maybe not, but certainly more than we have seen in the last year.”
Dismal weather conditions meant that no crossings were registered in the last 15 days of 2023, the longest consecutive period without arrivals in the past 12 months. The final crossings of the year recorded by the Home Office occurred on December 16, when 55 people travelled from France in a single boat.
The prime minister is under pressure from the right of the Tory party to tighten emergency legislation that aims to facilitate the government’s flagship Rwanda removals policy, after the Supreme Court found it was unlawful.
Political wrangling over the bill is expected to dominate debate within the party when MPs return to parliament on January 8.
Sunak’s administration is hopeful that flights to the African nation will take off this year, allowing the Conservatives to argue in an election campaign that their plan to deter small boat crossings is on track.
A spike in the number of Albanians who arrived in the UK in small boats in 2022 was reversed last year, following a returns pact struck between London and Tirana. Albania is considered a safe country to which migrants can be returned.
Migration experts have highlighted that successful measures to reduce the number of Albanians arriving in the UK were not easily replicable for asylum seekers arriving from many other common origin countries, such as Afghanistan, which are deemed unsafe.
While 12,658 Albanians came to the UK by this route in 2022, accounting for 28 per cent of migrants, just 922 Albanians arrived by small boat between January 1 to November 29, representing 3 per cent of total arrivals by that date.
