Warm weather is blamed for a surge of Albanian migrants

Warm weather is blamed for a surge of Albanian migrants as the number who came last week equals those who have arrived in the last FIVE MONTHS

• Rishi Sunak said two weeks ago that illegal immigration plan ‘is starting to work’

The number of Albanian migrants reaching Britain in small boats has doubled in the past week.

The latest figures appear to realise Home Office predictions of a resurgence this spring after numbers plummeted over the colder months.

In the first five months of this year 151 Albanians arrived by small boat, according to published data. But in the past week the running total has doubled to almost 300, as a further 150 migrants arrived in just seven days, Border Force sources said.

Signs of a resurgence will alarm Rishi Sunak, who two weeks ago said his illegal immigration plan ‘is starting to work’. He voiced cautious optimism as arrivals showed a 20 per cent year-on-year dip.

However, this year’s arrivals are now just 10 per cent below the same point last year. Separate Home Office figures showed there were 333 arrivals – of all nationalities – across the Channel yesterday, bringing this year’s running total to 10,472. At the same point last year the figure stood at 11,662.

Border Force officials escort 50 migrants into Dover Docks, Kent in January earlier this year 

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaks during a meeting with Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson inside 10 Downing Street

Mr Sunak has made stopping small boats one of his five key pledges as Prime Minister after Albanian arrivals helped push last year’s total to a record 45,700.

In all, there were 12,301 Albanian small boat arrivals last year – the largest nationality overall – after a previously unseen surge from the east European country began in May. Albanian arrivals went from 235 in the first three months of last year to 1,930 in the following quarter and 9,037 in the next one.

From October to December they fell to 1,099 and then to 29 from January to March.

Provisional data for April 1 to May 30 showed there were 122 Albanian arrivals.

The Home Office said its Small Boats Operational Command was working with French partners and other agencies to ‘disrupt the people smugglers’.

n Egyptian small boat migrant Hamouda Chitioui, 34 – jailed yesterday at Winchester Crown court for attempting to enter the UK illegally but likely to be freed due to time spent on remand – told the judge if he had known he faced prison ‘I would not have come here’.

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