Reform UK targets English Channel military operation to stop boats

A Nigel Farage-led government would send the Royal Navy into the English Channel to intercept all migrant boats there and return them to France or Belgium under a plan called “Operation Fortress”.

The party says the plan is in line with international law and that it will both halt small boat arrivals and act as a humanitarian response.

Zia Yusuf, the party’s home affairs spokesman, said: “Britain is being invaded.

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“Tory and Labour governments responded with a free ferry service and free hotels.

“Reform UK will respond by launching the largest military operation in the English Channel since World War Two.

“Nigel Farage will order His Majesty’s Royal Navy to ensure that not a single unauthorised vessel crossing the English Channel makes it to the shores of the United Kingdom.

“Those who attempt it will be intercepted by our Armed Forces and returned to France.”

He said the move would make the border “impenetrable” and that “nobody” will be able to make it to UK shores via small boat.

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The party said the situation in the North African Spanish enclave of Ceuta, where some 60,000 migrants breached the border to enter Spanish territory earlier this week, shows the “urgency” of Reform’s plan for the UK.

Most of the migrants in Ceuta had walked back to neighbouring Morocco by Sunday.

Reform UK described the fundamental objective of its plan as humanitarian and claimed it would save lives in the Channel.

A total of 162 people died in the English Channel between 2018 and 2025, according to the University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory.

The party proposes to set up a joint military command with units from the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, RAF and British Army as well as a surveillance command to track incoming boats.

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The armed forces would intercept any unauthorised boats and detain their occupants, giving them water and food and a medical assessment before returning them under escort on navy vessels.

They would pass emergency legislation “as necessary” to give the joint command any further required powers.

Last Wednesday marked the busiest day for small boat crossings across the English Channel so far this year, with 752 migrants arriving in the UK.

But the number of overall arrivals for 2026 so far has dropped since last year.

The provisional total for the year so far is 14,526, 43% lower than the number recorded by this time last year (25,436) and down 14% on the same period in 2024 (16,903).