𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

France has stopped more than 20,000 migrants from crossing the Channel, preventing a record number of small boat arrivals, MPs have been told. Top Home Office bureaucrats defended the surge in small boat arrivals this year, admitting it could have been “a lot more”.

Simon Ridley, second permanent secretary at the Home Office, admitted “this year is challenging”, describing it as a “very complicated and wicked problem”. Mr Ridley told the Home Affairs Select Committee that the French stopped 20,000 from crossing the Channel between January and September. But the Home Office later told the Daily Express the data actually covered up to the end of October.

Over this period, more than 34,000 migrants crossed the Channel. This means the French have only intercepted 37% of crossings.

Mr Ridley said: “Small boat crossings are the definition of a very complicated and wicked problem.

“It’s not a single linear transmission from one single action or multiple clear actions to achieve an easily quantifiable reduction in boat crossings.

“What we have is a clear plan and strategy.

“We have a number of metrics, in terms of outputs, that we are seeking, whether that is arrests, boat seizures, equipment seizures, and the number of people disrupted from getting onto boats in northern France, arrests we are making in the UK.

“We have prevented a lot of activity. We talk about 20,000 disruptions at the border, we have seized significant numbers of boats at the Bulgarian-Turkish border, we have made a number of arrests in the UK, passed on intelligence for arrests in Europe, both of local facilitators and other more significant members of the criminal enterprise.

“If we hadn’t done all of that, a lot more people would have crossed in small boats.

“Clearly, this year is challenging, and the numbers are up on last year.

“We’re seeing far more crowding of individual boats. We have seen difficult tactics on the beaches.”

More than 39,000 migrants have crossed the Channel this year, the second-highest annual total with more than a year to go.

And top civil servants at the Home Office have admitted the department lost financial discipline.

Antonia Romeo, the Home Office permanent secretary, said: “Having drawn from the Treasury’s reserve for several years now, the department’s financial discipline has been weakened and there is a lack of a commercial mindset with inadequate focus on value for money.”

It comes after a shocking report by the Home Affairs Select Committee revealed billions of pounds were squandered on up to 400 hotels for asylum seekers as the Channel migrant crisis spiralled out of control.

Ministers and officials “neglected” day-to-day management of their asylum accommodation providers, as the cost of the 10-year contracts tripled from £4.5billion to £15.3billion.

And asylum accommodation providers made “excessive” profits at taxpayers’ expense.

Dispersal accommodation costs £23.25 per person per night, according to Home Office documents seen by the Sunday Express. Hotels cost a staggering £144.98 per person per night. Accommodation at the former military base in Wethersfield, Essex, costs £132 per person per night.