Three‑year deal aims to curb migrant crossings in English Channel

ZUYDCOOTE (AP):

The UK and French governments signed a new multimillion-euro deal yesterday aimed at reducing the number of migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats, with increased police patrols and enhanced surveillance in northern France.

UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood and French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez formally endorsed the three-year agreement during a joint visit to the Dunkirk region.

Mahmood praised the new deal as providing “the right mix of skills and capabilities that we know will work on the beaches in order to reduce the crossings.”

Nuñez said that it will help in “combating illegal immigration networks, human trafficking networks, which are obviously extremely harmful.”

Under the agreement, the UK will provide £500 million (US$675 million) to strengthen measures in northern France, with an additional £160 million (US$216 million) depending on the success of new tactics to curb Channel crossings. If those efforts fail, the additional funding will be halted after one year, the UK Home Office said.

The plan aims at increasing the number of officers deployed on the ground from 907 now to 1,392 for the 2026-2029 period, along with the creation of an additional police unit dedicated to combating irregular migration, funded by France, the French Interior Ministry said.

It will also include the deployment of new technologies aimed at reducing departures of “taxi boats,” the term authorities use for small motorized vessels that are typically inflatable and used by smugglers to pick up migrants along long stretches of the northern French coast.

Unlike boats that migrants carry into the water themselves, “taxi boats” typically set off largely empty from secluded coastal areas and pick up migrants at prearranged meeting points on beaches.

The deal also expands surveillance capabilities through drones, helicopters and electronic monitoring, to better prevent crossing attempts.

So far this year, more than 6,000 migrants have reached the UK after crossing the Channel, down 36 per cent from the same period last year, a drop that may partly reflect more unsettled weather.

The real evidence will emerge over the coming months as the weather turns warmer and the Channel turns less choppy. In 2025, a total of 41,472 people made the crossing that way — the second-highest annual figure since records began in 2018, after a peak of 45,755 in 2022.

Police operations led to the arrest of 480 smugglers last year, the French Interior Ministry said.

A large share of the resources provided under the new deal will be deployed from the early summer.

Critics say that the new deal, which builds on the Sandhurst Treaty, first signed in 2018 and renewed in 2023, isn’t addressing the underlying issue

“Policing alone will not prevent desperate people from turning to dangerous small boats in the first place,” said Imran Hussain from the Refugee Council, a UK charity that aims to promote the rights of refugees.

At least 162 people have died at the French-UK border over the past three years.