People smugglers forcing women and children to steer boats across Channel in bid to avoid arrest

There have been a record 8,300 people arrive in small boat this year

Young boy at the back of a dinghy
The Telegraph understands that to counter the aerial surveillance, women and children are being positioned at the rear of the small inflatables and instructed to navigate across the busy waterway.   Credit: Steve Finn

People smugglers bringing migrants to the UK in small boats are forcing women and children to steer the vessels in a bid to avoid arrest.

The callous tactic has been employed on a number of occasions in the last three months after trafficking gangs in Europe saw a spike in the number of their members being taken into custody in the UK.

Since a military Watchkeeper drone was deployed in September, smugglers who are facilitating illegal entry into the UK have been caught on camera with their hands on the tiller, making it much easier to secure convictions.

Now, The Telegraph understands that to counter the aerial surveillance, women and children are being positioned at the rear of the small inflatables and instructed to navigate across the busy waterway.

“This is what they do now, make the boys hold the motor. The boys and the women,” said one Iranian migrant who crossed the Channel this year.

Boats used by migrants piled high in Dover
There have been a record 8,300 people arrive in small boat this year Credit: BEN STANSALL/AFP via Getty Images

Despite a record 8,300 small boat arrivals this year Border Force have been more proactive in their surveillance of the Channel and there has been a sharp rise in the number of arrests.

This year Immigration Enforcement have convicted 57 individuals for people smuggling, including those convicted of facilitating small boat Channel crossings, resulting in sentencing of over 138 years. 

A further 46 people have been convicted of offences related to the small boat crossings.

In November, an Iranian man was jailed for smuggling himself and 18 other people – including three children - across the Channel into the UK on board a dangerously overcrowded boat.

At Canterbury Crown Court Sayed Hossein, 43, was sentenced to two years and four months imprisonment. He had pleaded guilty to assisting unlawful immigration into the UK and was the eighth man to be jailed since August in relation to steering a small boat.

Aerial surveillance operating over the Channel on July 17 captured footage of a RHIB zig-zagging away from a French coastguard vessel as it made its way into UK territorial waters.

Photos were also taken by Border Force officers as their cutter moved in to intercept the RHIB and then all the occupants of the RHIB were photographed upon their arrival in Dover.

An investigation into the incident was referred to Immigration Enforcement’s Criminal and Financial Investigation (CFI) team.

Analysis of the footage and photos clearly identified Hossein as the man at the helm.

Sayed Hossein at the helm
Sayed Hossien was convicted after photographs showed him in control of a boat carrying 18 people across the Channel Credit: NCA

In the interview he told officers that he had paid 4,000 Euros to an agent to travel from Iran to Greece, where he had remained for three years before paying another 3,000 Euros to leave Greece.

Home Secretary Priti Patel said: “We are unapologetically going after the law breakers who are facilitating this international criminal trade. Make no mistake, they will feel the full force of the law. 

“These criminals are taking advantage of a broken asylum system which allows those coming into the country via illegally-facilitated routes to elbow aside those most in need of our protection. I am fixing the asylum and immigration system to make it firm on those who seek to abuse the system and fair for those who need our help.”

But despite the increased number of arrests, charities say that police should focus on capturing the leaders of these criminal gangs, not the foot soldiers.

Clare Moseley, founder of Care4Calais told the Telegraph: “The Courts have recently made it clear that desperate people who are reliant on the smugglers for their crossing have no control over their manner of passage - their overriding motivation is simply to get to the UK.  

“This focus on those at the very bottom of criminal networks only highlights the lack of progress in prosecuting those at the top.”

Crossings have slowed over the Christmas period with the arrival of storm Bella, but on Boxing Day, one group of seven people made the dangerous journey in near-freezing temperatures and reached the UK

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