Longer than a double-decker bus, the mega dinghies raking in £300,000 a trip for the traffickers

It was a floating death trap and at 42ft tall, it was taller than a double-decker bus. The massive inflatable ship, probably assembled in a backstreet workshop in China, carried an incredible 165 migrants towards the British coast.

When shocking footage of this ‘mega boat’ on the water emerged last week, it was a chilling demonstration of the utter disdain that people smugglers have for human life.

And for the Labor Government these huge galleys are inextricable evidence of the Canal’s ‘small boats’ problem.

Last Thursday’s extraordinary scenes led to a teenager who allegedly piloted the record-breaking boat appearing in court on charges of endangering lives.

Chan Mathok Atak, 19, from Sudan, appeared before Margate magistrates’ court for the first time; Prosecutor Lucie Fish said the boat was of poor quality, overcrowded and ‘appeared to deflate upon intervention’.

In 2018, when the canal crisis began, the average number of migrants on boats was less than seven.

In 2022, a record year for arrivals, the average number per boat increased to 41. Now that number is just under 66.

The all-time record for the number of migrants on a boat has been surpassed twice this month.

It rose from 125 set last September to 128 on July 10, a record that was later broken by last week’s 165-passenger mega boat.

So what causes smugglers’ boats to grow to such a remarkable size?

This incident is likely a sign of the desperation of the criminals behind the plan. As law enforcement cracks down on the trade, marine equipment like engines is becoming harder to come by.

And it is precisely this desperation that makes Home Minister Shabana Mahmood so worried about what is happening in the Canal. As one of its first acts in seizing power, Labor canceled the previous Tory government’s Rwanda asylum deal out of sheer spite.

Labor under Sir Keir Starmer had opposed the deal for the two years it took the Conservatives to give the legal green light for their deportation to the east African country.

Remarkably, evidence published by the Home Office shows that the Rwanda plan began deterring Channel crossings even before it came into force.

Regardless, Labor has pressed ahead with its alternative plan to ‘break up gangs’, based on strengthening police and other law enforcement operations.

It was a complete failure in the beginning. Last year saw the second highest number of crossings in history, with 41,500. However, there has been a significant decline so far this year. There were 13,376 arrivals, representing a 45 percent decrease compared to the same point last year.

But despite Andy Burnham’s claim that ‘the plan is working’, these figures do not necessarily indicate great success for Labour. Coming into 2025 included an increase at the beginning of that year, which skewed the numbers slightly; In January, February and early spring of this year, long-term strong winds were experienced.

However, it is encouraging that the police are taking some steps against human traffickers. The National Crime Agency says that since early 2023 it and its international partners have seized more than 1,500 boats and motorboats, including 25 in the port of Felixstowe earlier this month. Last summer, Britain imposed sanctions against a Chinese company that produced inflatables and several Iraqis who supplied them to smugglers’ gangs. These are all reputable jobs.

But organized smuggling gangs, like their illegal drug dealing counterparts, are extremely resilient and will stop at nothing to protect their multi-million pound business models.

A patrol boat delivers life jackets to a raft off Gravelines, near Calais. July 29, 2026

Assuming each migrant typically pays a fee of £2,000, the megabot alone is likely to make a staggering £300,000 profit.

It is clear that smugglers are not deterred. David Neal, former chief inspector of border and immigration, said: ‘Organised criminal gangs are highly adept at evading any measures put in place by law enforcement.

‘If the police manage to block a street from which smugglers supply boats and marine equipment, the gangs immediately block other manufacturers, import routes etc. will start searching. Dealing with organized criminals is a constant game of cat and mouse.

‘The use of extra-large boats shows that smugglers have changed their tactics in this way. They’ve probably now found a new manufacturer who will make these larger boats to order.

‘This may even indicate that law enforcement’s success in seizing outboard motors has increased the size of the boats; In other words, they have fewer engines and therefore use them to power fewer larger boats.’

The use of super-sized boats that can carry 160 people is also life-threatening.

‘We have already seen tragedies in the Channel where dozens of people have drowned as a result of a single boat capsizing… There have also been scores of migrants being crushed and crushed to death in boats, and with so many more people on single boats, this certainly becomes an even greater risk.

‘Authorities may be even more reluctant to approach such vessels at sea because the wake created by patrol boats could risk destabilizing these already overloaded unseaworthy boats.’

This possibility of mass drowning is what keeps house secretaries awake at night. Previous incumbents had spoken privately about the guilt they felt following the Channel deaths and considered whether there was anything they could have done to prevent the loss of life.

Former border monitor Mr Neal said: ‘Smugglers care only about their own profits and are indifferent to the safety of the migrants they smuggle. They will pack more and more immigrants into these death trap boats just to make money, with potentially disastrous consequences.

‘As a result, the very worthwhile aim of targeting organized crime gangs and their supply chains could have the unintended side effect of making Channel crossings even more dangerous.’