A multiple casualty event involving migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats is “only a matter of time”, the UK’s border security chief has warned.
Duncan Capps, the Border Security Commander, said he was worried by the increase in the size of boats and the number of migrants getting on to each vessel.
Mr Capps told the UK Parliament’s Home Affairs Committee that this was a result of smugglers adapting their tactics in the face of action by the British and French authorities to cut off the supply of boats.
But while this has reduced the number of arrivals to the lowest point since 2020 and could even push them to 2019 levels, the risks for the asylum seekers themselves are increasing. A record 230 migrants were spotted this year on a vessel described as a “mega dinghy”.
“I think the things that worry me about it most this year have been the increase in size of the boats and the increase in occupancy,” he told MPs. “You've seen this year we had a boat with 230 migrants. It is only a matter of time until we have a mass casualty event in the Channel. It's extraordinary that that has not happened so far.”
Mr Capps, a former army general who was commandant of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, heads the Border Security Command, which was set up by the Labour government after it won the 2024 general election to tackle people smuggling gangs.
He told MPs that smugglers were now moving further south from around the Dunkirk and Calais area to Normandy, in a bid to avoid being intercepted while moving their boats to launch sites on beaches.
“My absolute aim over this next two or three months working with our French partners is to shut that route down for lots of very good reasons," said Mr Capps. “Not least of which, it's nearly 60 nautical miles. If people try that in the winter, we are going to have loss of life, and it really, really concerns me.”
Mr Capps said there are currently around 3,800 migrants in northern France, mostly living in a squalid camp near Dunkirk, which is double the figure of around two years ago. He said that was down to the French making it very difficult to get across the Channel.
The UK and France signed a £660 million ($891 million) three-year agreement to prevent migrant Channel crossings, which has been credited with reducing numbers.