More than 50,000 small boat migrants have now crossed the English Channel illegally since Sir Keir Starmer came to power, GB News can exclusively reveal.
The shockingly high figure was reached today when a further 430 migrants made the journey from France.
The news will make grim reading for the Prime Minister, who has been struggling to make an impact on the record numbers of migrants crossing the Channel.
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Last Wednesday, a partial deal to return a small number of small boat migrants back to France became operational.
But since then, people smugglers have pushed on defiantly, successfully launching more than 1,500 migrants across to UK waters.
Last year, after the Labour Government came to power vowing to "Smash the Gangs", a further 23,242 made the illegal voyage.
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|More than 50,000 small boat migrants have crossed Channel since Keir Starmer came to power
After today's arrivals, GB News provisional figures put the number of migrants to have crossed the Channel this year at 26,986.
Combined with last year's total under Labour, that shows that 50,227 have now reached the UK by small boat under Sir Keir Starmer's leadership.
The Prime Minister has said he is confident that Labour's policies under the new Border Security Command will reduce small boat numbers, but that any reductions will take time.
A Home Office spokesperson said: "Through international intelligence sharing under our Border Security Command, enhanced enforcement operations in Northern France and tougher legislation in the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, we are strengthening international partnerships and boosting our ability to identify, disrupt, and dismantle criminal gangs whilst strengthening the security of our borders."
GB News | Migrants arriving in Dover
The revelation of the latest figures comes as Sir Keir Starmer has been warned that current migrant numbers could "double" by the end of the year.
Speaking to GB News, Rob Bates, a research director from the Centre of Migration Control, claimed that Britain could see 50,000 migrants cross illegally into Britain by the end of the year.
He also declared the crisis is "getting out of hand".
Sharing his stark prediction for the record-breaking numbers, Bates told GB News: "I think we're now at the point that this is far exceeding even the worst years that we saw in 2022 and 2023.
"We're about 40 per cent up when it comes to Channel crossings on last year, and we are probably going to see 50,000 people come across the English Channel."
Highlighting the percentage of those that will end up being deported under Labour's new exchange scheme with France, Bates added: "And then you look at what the Government are actually trying to introduce in terms of a scheme with France, one in, one out, that probably by the end of this year will in the best case scenario see 800 people returned to France.
"You realise that actually their plan would see two per cent of those that are probably going to come across this year removed."
Although GB News' Christopher Hope argued that it could be the start of a "successful policy" for Starmer, Bates claimed that the scheme could result in "longer-term costs" for Britons.
Bates explained: "We need to ask ourselves whether having a scheme where we end up with the same number of asylum seekers, just at different stages of being processed through the system, is something that the British public would actually tolerate at this point.
"We need to realise that actually the British public are more concerned about the cost of this, and if we're bringing in individuals who've had their asylum claims processed and accepted, these are then individuals who are now our responsibility to look after and when needed to provide welfare and housing, without any spectre of them being removed from the country."