Boats Back in the Channel as 3,800 Wait in French Camps, a Day After Healey’s ‘Good Job’ Claim

News | By Matt, Editor

Small boats were back in the Channel on Thursday after three weeks of storms. GB News reported about 150 migrants had crossed or were crossing by the morning, the first arrivals since 7 October. Britain’s border chief told MPs last week that almost 3,800 more are waiting in the two main camps in northern France, about double the usual number. (GB News, 29 October 2026; Home Affairs Committee, 21 October 2026)

It came a day after Chancellor John Healey said Labour is doing “a good job on migration” and backed £150 million for a “small handful” of large asylum sites. We covered that in Healey’s “good job” on migration.

Key facts

• Today: about 150 crossed or were crossing on Thursday morning, GB News reported. The Home Office normally publishes each day’s official count the following day. (GB News)
• The gap: no arrivals were recorded from 8 to 28 October. The last were 119 people in two boats on 7 October. (Home Office)
• This year: 20,935 arrivals up to 28 October, against 36,954 at the same point in 2025. That is 43% fewer. (Home Office time series)
• The camps: “almost 3,800 people” near Calais and Dunkirk, against “broadly about 2,000” in the past. (Border Security Commander Duncan Capps)
• Since 2018: 213,545 people have crossed by small boat, up to 28 October. (Home Office)

What happened at Dover

Just after 8am the Border Security Command vessel Contender brought the first group into Dover Harbour from a dinghy in mid-Channel. GB News counted 72 people, mostly young men, taken off for health and security checks. (GB News)

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More than 80 others were on a so-called “taxi boat”, a large dinghy thought to have launched from a beach in Belgium. It stopped near Dunkirk, where more people waded out to climb aboard. French patrols were out at several other points on the coast. GB News said the short weather window is due to close again on Friday. (GB News)

Eight days earlier, on 21 October, Major General Capps had told MPs the Belgian route was “pretty much shut down”. (Home Affairs Committee)

The border chief’s warning

Capps said the full camps were “bad in one respect because a lot of people are there”, but showed the French were making it “very difficult” to cross around Dunkirk and Calais. (Home Affairs Committee)

He said boats now carry an average of 69 people, and one this year carried 230. “It is only a matter of time until we have a mass casualty event in the channel,” he told MPs. Gangs have also launched from Normandy, a crossing of nearly 60 nautical miles. “If people try that in the winter, we are going to have loss of life,” he said. (Home Affairs Committee)

Is the fall down to Labour or the weather?

The Home Office told GB News: “We have made progress tackling the small boats. Crossings are down significantly, and we have just recorded the lowest number of summer arrivals since 2020.” It said joint work with partners had prevented over 50,000 crossing attempts and seized 1,100 boats and engines since the election. (GB News)

Labour credits its partnership with France and extra French beach patrols. Maritime security sources told GB News a year of bad weather has also played a part, and that gangs have moved further west to avoid patrols around Dunkirk and Calais. (GB News) GB News put the fall at more than 46%. The Home Office’s own time series shows 43%, the figure Capps also gave MPs.

Returns, France and the EU

Capps told MPs that about 5% of small boat arrivals since 2018 have been returned, fewer than 7,000 people. The “one in, one out” pilot with France returned 1,631 people. France would not extend it beyond this month, saying any returns deal should be with the EU as a whole. (Home Affairs Committee)

At the same hearing, Liberal Democrat MP Ben Maguire pressed for Britain to rejoin Eurodac, the EU asylum fingerprint database. Before Brexit, EU returns under the Dublin rules were small: Britain sent back 209 people in 2018, as our report on Andy Burnham’s Brexit claim showed.

Our view

This section is opinion.

Ministers want credit for a quiet October. The Channel was quiet because of the storms. The day the weather broke, the boats came back, and the camps across the water are fuller than usual. The border chief himself says the next big tragedy is “a matter of time”.

A 43% fall is welcome, but 21,000 arrivals in ten months is not “a good job”. With barely one in twenty ever returned, the answer is not to trade Brexit freedoms for EU databases and EU-wide deals. It is to make sure that anyone who crosses illegally knows they will not stay.

FAQ

How many people have crossed the Channel in 2026?

The Home Office recorded 20,935 up to 28 October. Thursday’s crossings take the total past 21,000. (Home Office)

Why were there no crossings for three weeks?

Stormy weather in the Channel. GB News said crossings resumed once it cleared overnight. More on the numbers in our small boat crossings explainer.

Sources

• GB News, Mark White, 29 October 2026: Hundreds of illegal immigrants cross Channel after three weeks of bad weather finally clears
• Home Office: Migrants detected crossing the English Channel in small boats (time series to 22 October and last-7-days table, updated 29 October 2026)
• Home Affairs Committee: Oral evidence, Border Security Command, 21 October 2026
• Breaking Brexit News: Healey’s “good job” on migration; Small boat crossings explained; Burnham and the Dublin returns
• Main image: Migrants in life jackets with Border Force officers at Dover. Screengrab: GB News video.