Child given a wheelchair as migrants arrive in UK after crossing English Channel

They are the first arrivals since more than 200 people made the journey on one day last week

A group of people, one of them in a wheelchair, are brought ashore in Dover, Kent, from a Border Force vessel. PA Wire

A child was given a wheelchair as a group of migrants were brought ashore in Dover after crossing the English Channel.

Pictures on Tuesday show men, women and children wearing life jackets and blankets disembarking from a Border Force vessel at the Kent port.

It is understood the child was provided a wheelchair by Border Force on arrival in Dover due to a medical condition.

They are the first arrivals in a week since 206 people made the journey on August 19, according to Home Office figures.

A group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, from a Border Force vessel following a small boat incident in the Channel. PA Wire

A total of 19,294 people had arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel as of August 26, which is about 2 per cent lower than the same point in 2023 (19,741) and 20 per cent lower than in 2022 (24,153).

UK officials began counting these “irregular” arrivals in 2018, when there were just 11 in the first half of the year.

Since then, more than 133,000 people have arrived – 70 per cent of them men and around a fifth were under-18s.

Migrants attempt to cross the Channel from France – in pictures

A Sudanese migrant on the beach at Gravelines, near Dunkirk, after leaving a smuggler's boat which was punctured with a knife by French police officers to prevent an attempt to cross the English Channel. All Photos: AFP

French National Police launch tear gas from a vehicle to disperse migrants on the beach of Gravelines.

A migrant comforts another person who collapsed after failing to board a smuggler's boat.

Migrants in the water at Gravelines trying to board a smuggler's boat.

A Sudanese migrant is helped to the shore by others after failing to board a smuggler's boat.

Migrants walk into the sea.

French National Police officers confiscate a dinghy.

Afghans made up 18 per cent of the arrivals in the year to June – the single largest nationality cohort – followed by Iranians (13 per cent), Vietnamese (10 per cent), Turkish (10 per cent) and Syrians (nine per cent).

The new statistics revealed the average numbers in each boat had increased again, from 10 in the year ending June 2019, 44 in the year ending June 2023 to 51 people in the latest corresponding period.

UK authorities have repeatedly warned that smuggling gangs organising the crossings are adapting their methods, using bigger boats and packing more people in.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer has vowed to “smash the gangs” as the centrepiece of his strategy to tackle the issue, after scrapping contentious Conservative plans to deport thousands of migrants to Rwanda.