Labour MPs have called for a Rwanda-style deportation scheme as official figures showed the number of asylum applications in the UK reaching a new record high.
Home Office data showed a total of 111,084 people applied for asylum in the UK in the year to June – up 14 per cent from 97,107 in the year to June 2024.
It is the highest number for any 12-month period since current records began in 2001.
Of the claims, 39 per cent were made by people who arrived in the UK after crossing the English Channel.
Just over a year ago, Labour MPs were elected to Parliament on a party manifesto that pledged to scrap the previous Tory government’s migration deal with Rwanda.
This would have seen Channel migrants given a one-way ticket to the African country, where they would have their asylum claims processed.
Sir Keir Starmer ended the Rwanda deal on his first full day as Prime Minister, but is yet to see little success in his pledge to instead ‘smash’ people smuggling gangs.
He is now facing calls by Labour MPs to consider a similar scheme as they voice fears about the ‘dire’ migration figures amid the rise of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.
Sir Keir Starmer ended the Rwanda deal on his first full day as Prime Minister, but is yet to see little success in his pledge to instead ‘smash’ people smuggling gangs
Tory MP Dame Priti Patel pictured while she was home secretary signing the Migration and Economic Development Partnership with Rwanda’s foreign minister Vincent Biruta in 2022
A group of people believed to be migrants are pictured on a small boat near Gravelines, northern France
In a recent article for Chad, his local newspaper, Mansfield MP Steve Yemm pointed to the effect of Donald Trump’s tough border policies in the US.
He wrote: ‘Labour must focus on innovative solutions like return hubs overseas and new bilateral agreements.
‘Under those agreements, every small boat arrival would be sent not to a UK hotel but to a third country where they would stay even if their claim was upheld.
‘If all 900 arrivals were deported on a Monday, and all 700 on the Tuesday, then how many might arrive on the Friday?
‘Probably, we would see a US style collapse in numbers.’
The i Paper reported that another Labour MP had previously said ‘nothing should be off the table’ when asked about a potential Rwanda-style scheme.
They called for a ‘proper deterrent’ to stop asylum seekers crossing the Channel following the publication of the latest migration figures on Thursday.
The Government is under increasing pressure to immediately end the use of hotels for housing asylum seekers.
It follows a judge granting Epping Forest District Council a temporary injunction on Tuesday that blocked asylum seekers from being housed at the Bell Hotel in Essex.
The latest figures showed there were more than 32,000 asylum seekers in hotels, marking a rise of 8 per cent during Labour’s first year in office.
Labour has pledged to end the use of hotels to house asylum seekers by the end of this parliament in 2029.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper insisted Labour had taken “crucial steps” in the past year towards this by cutting the asylum backlog and money spent on the asylum system, increasing returns of failed asylum seekers and overhauling appeals.
While the number of asylum seekers housed in hotels has risen, Government spending on asylum in the UK is down 12 per cent, the Home Office data showed.
The number waiting on an initial decision on an asylum application in the UK at the end of June dropped below 100,000 for the first time in four years.
Separate figures published on Thursday show the number of enforced returns of people who have no legal right to stay in the UK rose slightly in the latest quarter.
Some 2,323 returns by the Home Office took place in April-June 2025, up from 2,314 in January-March this year.
A total of 9,072 enforced returns took place in the year to June, up 25% from 7,253 in the previous year and the highest figure for a 12-month period since the year to December 2018 (9,236).
In a letter to Ms Cooper this week, Tory shadow home secretary Chris Philp wrote: ‘This migration crisis has happened because you made the catastrophic decision to cancel the Rwanda deterrent just before it was due to start, with no replacement plan.
‘The Rwanda scheme would have seen every illegal immigrant deported upon arrival and made it impossible to claim asylum if you entered the UK illegally.’
