The dangerous immigration representing the small boats that almost daily cross the United Kingdom has been one of the great axes of the state visit of President Emmanuel Macron to the island.
He, where the United Kingdom will return to France to those who cross the La Mancha channel in exchange for receiving asylum plaintiffs from France, is a new attempt to stop this route.
The increase in crosses, the danger of the route or legal changes to stop it are some of the keys to this thorny matter that forces both countries to degrease post-overxit relations.
A dangerous route
The 33 kilometers that separate the French coast of the British are a dangerous challenge for migrants who dare to cross them, due to strong currents and hostile weather conditions, together with the intense ship traffic.
To this is joined by the precariousness of the vessels used, often inflatables, which caused death in 2024 of at least 73 people, according to the International Migration Organization.
Cruces record
Between January and June 2025, according to data from the Home Office (British Interior Ministry), 19,982 people arrived in the United Kingdom.
This is the highest figure for a first semester since there are records and is 50 % higher than that registered in the same period last year.
This same Thursday, while the British Prime Minister, Labor Keir Starmer, and Macron finished profiling the agreement, more than 200 migrants were rescued by the border guard and landed in the port of Dover (southern England), according to British media.
Legislative changes in France
To make it difficult for these vessels to be made to the sea, Paris prepares a reform of the Internal Security Code to allow the police to detain the boats in their territorial waters, included in areas near the coast.
The BBC showed images of French gendarmes pricking with knives a pneumatic boat in the water to which a group of irregular immigrants were climbing, so far something vetoed in the French norms.
“One inside, one outside”
Among the conclusions of this bilateral summit, both delegations announced on Thursday a reciprocal repatriation agreement of migrants, which has been called “one inside, one outside”.
This assumes that for each deported immigrant who has entered the United Kingdom illegally, the British Government will accept an asylum applicant with a family connection in the country that is in France.
“The migrants who arrive in small boats will be arrested and returned to France in a short time,” Starmer said in the appearance with Macron.
The British prime minister, Keir Starmer, greets the French president, Emmanuel Macron, at number 10 of Downing Street, before the Franco-British summit of July 10, 2025.
What happens later?
According to European legislation, Dublin II – migrants who arrive to the continent must request asylum in the first country they stepped on, so many of those deported to France must pursue asylum requests to the countries that received them.
Countries like Greece, Spain or Italy are the ones that receive the most irregular migrants, according to Frontex.
The negotiations on this mechanism began in April of this year, although, according to the Observatory of the University of Oxford, the capacity of return of people who arrived in the United Kingdom in small boats is limited and the deportations of this type made between 2018 and 2024 are encrypted in approximately 400.
