Almost 6,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel so far this year, setting a new record for the number of crossings in the first three months of the year.
So far in 2025, there have been 5,847 arrivals - including 335 on Sunday - provisional data from the Home Office shows.
As a result, the rate has already surpassed numbers from last year, when 5,435 migrants made the perilous journey throughout the course of January, February and March of 2024.
The new numbers have certainly sky-rocketed above the figure from 2023 (3,793) and 2022 (4,548).
Almost 6,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel so far this year
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The total for this year has marked a 36 per cent rise from the same point last year (4,306) and 59 per cent at this stage in 2023 (3,683)
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The total for this year has marked a 36 per cent rise from the same point last year (4,306) and 59 per cent at this stage in 2023 (3,683).
Such figures have followed the Government's pledge to crack down on "vile" people-smuggling gangs with Home Secretary Yvette Cooper's plans to introduce new criminal offences and hand police and enforcement agencies counter terror-style powers to tackle the high number of crossings.
The numbers have also come after the body of a migrant was found near a beach in Calais body of a migrant was found near a beach in Calais this morning - marking the fifth body found so far this year.
The grim discovery was made in sand dunes at Les Hemmes de Marck, near the French port this morning, where a police cordon remains in place around the scene.
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Last week, two other migrants were confirmed dead after their fatal attempt to make the crossing on Wednesday and Thursday, the French coastguard confirmed.
The International Organisation for Migration has also reported several more migrant deaths which authorities believed could be connected to attempts to travel from Europe to Britain this year.
A Home Office spokesman said: "We all want to end dangerous small boat crossings, which threaten lives and undermine our border security.
"The people-smuggling gangs do not care if the vulnerable people they exploit live or die, as long as they pay.
Earlier this month, Labour signed a "road-map" agreement with France to increase co-operative efforts to combat people smugglers
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"We will stop at nothing to dismantle their business models and bring them to justice."
Earlier this month, Labour signed a "road-map" agreement with France to increase co-operative efforts to combat groups smuggling migrants across the choppy waves of the English Channel.
Cooper's new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill is also currently making its way through the parliamentary system which will hand down new counter terror-type powers to police and agencies.
A Downing Street spokesman said on Friday: "We’ve acknowledged that there is a flow of migrants into this country by illegal means on small boats and we’ve seen a number of incidents in this week in French waters.
"That’s why this Government has put forward a serious credible plan to finally restore order to the chaos we inherited in our asylum system."
