• This is an 18% increase from the previous year and the highest ever recorded for this period.
• The data follows over a week of anti-immigration riots across England and Northern Ireland.
• Health and care workers’ visas fell by four-fifths from April to June compared to 2023.

Official data released Thursday revealed that the number of migrants arriving in Britain by crossing the Channel on boats reached a record in the first half of 2024. The UK processed 13,489 so-called small boat migrants during these six months, marking an 18 percent increase from the previous year and the highest figure ever recorded for this period, according to interior ministry statistics. Meanwhile, regular immigration by health workers and students declined.

This compares to 11,433 migrants making the perilous journey across one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes from January to June in 2023. The figures highlight the challenge facing the UK’s new Labour government as it seeks to reduce cross-Channel arrivals amidst growing public unease over the issue.

The data followed more than a week of unrest, referred to as anti-immigration riots, across England and Northern Ireland. During these disturbances, some mobs chanted “stop the boats.” This phrase was part of an unfulfilled pledge from former Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who lost last month’s general election to Labour’s Keir Starmer.

The disturbances, which affected more than a dozen English towns and cities, followed a deadly knife attack on a group of children. The attack was mistakenly blamed on a Muslim asylum seeker.

Meanwhile, the number of arrivals of health sector workers, students, and their dependents dropped in the most recent quarter and the year up to June. This decline coincided with tighter visa regulations announced by Sunak’s government last December and implemented in April, aimed at reducing record immigration levels.

Visas issued for health and care workers, a sector struggling with staffing shortages, fell by four-fifths from April to June compared to the same period in 2023. Student visas granted decreased by 13 percent in the year to June, and visas for students’ dependents dropped by 81 percent year-on-year in the first half of 2024.

Various industry and higher education lobby groups have expressed concerns about the new restrictions, which have prevented some dependents from coming to the UK and increased minimum salary requirements for certain workers.

Regarding Channel crossings, the latest figures revealed that 81 percent of arrivals by individuals without legal permission to enter the UK in the year to June came via small boats from mainland Europe.

UK officials began counting these “irregular” arrivals in 2018 when they recorded just 11 in the first half of the year. Since then, more than 133,000 individuals have arrived—70 percent of them men and about a fifth under 18, according to the data.

Afghans made up 18 percent of the arrivals in the year to June, the largest nationality cohort, followed by Iranians (13 percent), Vietnamese (10 percent), Turkish (10 percent), and Syrians (nine percent). The new statistics revealed that the average number of people per boat increased again, from 10 in the year ending June 2019 to 44 in the year ending June 2023, and up to 51 in the latest corresponding period.

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