At least 25,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel to Kent so far in 2022, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Defence. A total of 915 people reached Kent in 19 small boats on Saturday. Women and children were among a group brought ashore by an RNLI lifeboat at Dungeness. There have been 8,747 crossings detected in August so far, with 3,733 in the past week. Monday saw 1,295, the highest daily total on record.
The provisional total of crossings for the year so far was now 25,146, according to the Ministry of Defence. It is more than four months since Home Secretary Priti Patel unveiled plans to send migrants to Rwanda to try to deter people from crossing the Channel. Since then 19,878 have arrived in the UK after making the journey.
