PEOPLE smugglers are turning to alternative routes into Britain to beat a small boats crackdown.
The gangs are increasingly being paid by asylum seekers to hide them in vehicles.
They are also overstaying visas, according to the Refugee Council.
Just three in ten asylum claims are now made by small boat arrivals, compared with four in ten the year before, it reports.
CEO Enver Solomon said: “It’s no secret that where you ramp up enforcement activity in relation to one route you’re going to see a shift in how people seek to get to the UK.”
Meanwhile, Labour will have to wave through another 62,000 applications to ease the backlog, the Refugee Council has predicted.
More than half of the 118,882 currently waiting will be allowed to stay, it suggests.
The Home Office, headed by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, is understood to have ramped up processing in recent weeks.
Cases built up after the previous Tory government stopped processing applications for those who arrived illegally.
Mr Solomon said: “Applications are moving again but we are concerned there is no clear plan yet to improve the rate of decision-making to keep pace with applications and avoid another backlog emerging.”
It comes as 176 crossed the Channel in three dinghies on Tuesday.
Small boat crossings in 2024 now total 27,509, compared with 26,116 this time last year.
The Home Office said: “We continue to remove more people with no right to be here — with over 3,000 people returned since we formed government — while also driving down the costs of asylum accommodation.”
