Overview

• Official data show 28,076 people have crossed the Channel in small boats so far in 2025, up 46% year on year, with 212 arrivals on Sunday across four boats.
• The High Court ordered the Home Office to relocate up to 138 men from the Bell Hotel in Epping, a ruling that spurred nationwide protests and further local legal challenges.
• Ministers announced an appeals overhaul that would use trained adjudicators instead of tribunal judges to tackle roughly 51,000 pending asylum appeals, which currently take about a year on average.
• The Home Office says at least five more asylum hotels will close by year-end with a “big surge” in closures in the new year, as Labour maintains its pledge to end hotel use by 2029.
• Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is set to outline plans for mass deportations on Tuesday, proposals critics such as former attorney general Dominic Grieve say would likely be blocked under UK law.