More than 500 people crossed Channel on Friday

More than 500 people arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel on Friday, as small boat crossings reached record levels.

Overall, 517 people arrived in eight boats on Friday, taking the annual total to 21,117, an increase of 56% on the same point last year, according to analysis by the PA news agency.

On Tuesday, the tally passed 20,000, the earliest point in the calendar year the figure has been reached since data was first collected in 2018, as ministers struggle with their pledge to “smash the gangs” of people-smugglers who facilitate the journeys.

It comes after reports on Friday that French police officers had used knives to puncture a boat off the French coast.

The Government has repeatedly pushed for French authorities to do more to prevent boats leaving the shore, including changing existing rules to allow police officers to intervene when dinghies are in the water.

Those changes have not yet come into effect, but reports on Friday suggested tougher action was already being taken.

Meanwhile, the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has announced a “crackdown” on immigration enforcement targeting illegal working in the gig economy.

Officers will carry out checks in hotspots across the country where they suspect asylum seekers are working as delivery riders without permission.

It comes after Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat said they would ramp up facial verification and fraud checks over the coming months after conversations with ministers.

Ms Cooper said: “Illegal working undermines honest business and undercuts local wages. The British public will not stand for it, and neither will this Government.

“Often those travelling to the UK illegally are sold a lie by the people-smuggling gangs that they will be able to live and work freely in this country, when in reality they end up facing squalid living conditions, minimal pay and inhumane working hours.

“We are surging enforcement action against this pull factor, on top of returning 30,000 people with no right to be here and tightening the law through our plan for change.”