No 10 admitted the UK was in the grip of a "migration emergency" today - but refused to force through its Rwanda deportation flights law before Easter. More than 4,000 people are thought to have crossed the English Channel this year, Home Office figures show. Today, a record 514 people made the journey on 10 boats - the highest number on a single day so far this year.
He said: "It is exactly because we are still seeing people making this perilous journey across the Channel, including people in the last few days, that the PM wants parliamentarians across the House to get behind this Bill and to stop the boats."The running total for Channel crossings in 2024 to 4,043 – 10% higher than this time last year . It is also 25% higher than the total at this stage in 2022 when there were 3,229 arrivals recorded, PA news agency analysis of the data indicates.