Sunak’s claim that small crossings have fallen by 36% in a year, fact-checked

Rishi Sunak claimed that migration decreased in an interview with Sky News (Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Rishi Sunak claimed that his Government has significantly reduced the number of small boats crossing the English Channel last year on Sunday.

Speaking on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, the Prime Minister said that the number of small boats crossing the Channel decreased by 36 per cent last year.

Mr Phillips responded to this claim by suggesting that over six thousand migrants crossed the Channel in the first quarter of 2024, “which is more than 25 per cent up on the same quarter last year.”

Mr Sunak attributed this increase to the surge in Vietnamese migrants crossing the Channel in the first quarter of 2024, adding that the Government is working with Vietnamese officials and the Home Office to “strengthen our migration cooperation.”

Here, i takes a closer look at Mr Sunak’s claims to find out if his Government really has made progress toward meeting his pledge to “stop the boats.”

Claim: the number of small boat crossings decreased by 36 per cent last year

When asked by Mr Phillips whether success is “zero small boats or just a smaller number,” the Prime Minister responded by suggesting that his Government “already did deliver a smaller number” of crossings.

Mr Sunak backed this claim up by saying that the number of small boats crossing the Channel decreased by 36 per cent last year.

Fact check: the number of small boats detected crossing the Channel decreased by nearly 46 per cent between 2022 and 2023.

Government data suggests that the decrease in the number of small boat crossings is larger than Mr Sunak claims, lying at 46 per cent as opposed to 36 per cent.

The Prime Minister was likely referring to the number of migrants on board the boats crossing the Channel, which fell by 36 per cent between 2022 and 2023.

Claim: Vietnamese migrants caused a rise in small boat crossings in 2024

Mr Phillips cast doubt on the Prime Minister’s success in reducing small boat crossings by highlighting that the number of arrivals in the first quarter of 2024 was significantly higher than the number of arrivals in the same period last year.

Mr Sunak responded by suggesting that “almost the entirety” of that increase “comes from one country: Vietnam.”

Fact check: There were 6,265 small boat arrivals in the first quarter of 2024, compared to 5,049 in the same period last year, an increase of 24 per cent.

A total of 1,266 Vietnamese migrants crossed the Channel in the first quarter of 2024, accounting for nearly 20 per cent of all crossings.

This figure rose by 17 per cent from the first quarter of 2023, when only 125 Vietnamese migrants crossed the Channel.

Although the number of Vietnamese migrant crossings shot up in the first quarter of 2024, this does not fully account for the increase in total crossings.

Assuming 125 Vietnamese migrants had crossed the Channel in the first quarter of 2024 as they did in 2023, the total number of crossings in the first quarter of this year would still be higher than the first quarter of last year.

In other words, if Vietnamese arrivals in the first quarter of 2024 had remained at 125, the total number of crossings would be 5,124, rising from 5,049 in the first quarter of last year.

Mr Sunak is right in saying that rising level of small boat crossings is primarily the result of a surge in Vietnamese migrant crossings, but even if this surge had not taken place, migrant crossings would have risen.