Enforced returns from UK jump 28% to highest annual figure in six years
There were 4,428 enforced returns in the second half of 2024, compared with 3,736 in the first six months.
The number of enforced returns of people who do not have a right to stay in the UK has jumped to the highest level in six years.
Some 8,164 enforced returns took place in 2024, up 28% on the previous 12 months.
It is the highest annual total since 2018, when the figure was 9,236, according to Home Office data published on Thursday.
A breakdown of the figures show there were 4,428 enforced returns in the second half of last year, compared with 3,736 in the first six months.
The Home Office is responsible for returning people to their country of origin if they do not have a legal right to remain in the UK.
There are three types of returns: enforced returns, which are carried out directly by the Home Office; voluntary returns, who are people who were facing deportation but left of their own accord, sometimes with support from the Home Office; and port returns, who are people refused entry to the UK and who have subsequently departed.
There were 25,186 voluntary returns in 2024, the highest annual number since 2016, and 23,009 port returns, down from 24,697 in 2023.
The combined total of enforced and voluntary returns last year, 33,350, is the highest annual figure since 40,377 in 2016.
Dame Angela Eagle, Home Office minister for border security and asylum, said: “Over the last six years, legal migration soared, a criminal smuggler industry was allowed to establish itself in the Channel, and the asylum system was broken.
“Through our Plan for Change we’re restoring order to the system and substantially increasing enforcement.
“Since July, returns are up to their highest level in half a decade.”
After the general election last July, Labour ministers redeployed 1,000 staff to work on immigration enforcement in a bid to remove people, including foreign criminals and those not eligible for asylum, from the country as quickly as possible.
Earlier this month, the Home Office released footage for the first time of migrants being escorted on to planes and deported.
Four nationalities together accounted for nearly two-thirds of enforced returns in 2024.
The most common was Albanian, accounting for 2,624 (32%) of the 8,164 total, followed by Romanian (1,514 or 19%), Brazilian (587 or 7%) and Polish (481 or 6%).
There were 5,034 foreign national offenders returned to their country of origin last year, up from 4,015 in 2023 and the highest number since 2019.
Of the 5,034 returned in 2024, nearly a third were Albanian (1,610 or 32%) while just under one in five were Romanian (956 or 19%).
The latest figures also show there were 485 enforced and voluntary returns in the three months to December of migrants who had arrived in the UK after crossing the English Channel in small boats.
This is down from 568 in the previous quarter.
Some 2,251 migrants who arrived in small boats were returned during 2024, up from 2,047 in 2023.
Of the 2,251 returns last year, 84% were Albanian nationals – a similar proportion to 2023 (87%).
Between January 2018 and December 2024, there were 4,995 returns of migrants who had arrived across the English Channel, 3% of small boat arrivals during the period.
Mihnea Cuibus of the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford said: “After a decade of decline, the number of people being removed from the UK was already on an upward trajectory before the election.
“Labour has dedicated more resources to immigration enforcement and this is likely to have had some impact on the numbers, though other factors will play a role too.
“For example, there has been an increase in the number of people refused visa extensions in the last couple of years.”
