The Home Office has been criticised after launching a new TikTok account showing videos of illegal migrants being detained and boasting about the government’s record on deportations – a move which has been dubbed a “laughable gimmick” by critics.
Launched on Tuesday, the ‘Secure Borders UK’ account currently has just one video.
With dramatic music playing in the background, the video cuts together clips of immigration enforcement officers raiding homes and businesses and arresting people thought to be in the UK illegally, while key immigration statistics play across the screen.
“Nearly 50,000 people returned or deported from the UK since July 2024. 83 per cent increase in illegal working arrests. 77 per cent increase in illegal working raids. And its just getting started”, the video boasts, as a clip of a plane taking off plays.
But responding to the new strategy, shadow home secretary Chris Philp said: “This is yet another pathetic gimmick that won’t work.
“The idea that putting some posts on TikTok will stop illegal immigrants is laughable — just like the government’s previous gimmick to smash the gangs.
“The Labour government is putting illegal channel immigrants up in hotels, allowing rampant illegal working and allowing 95 per cent of them to stay.”
He added: “The only way to stop this is to leave the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights) so every single illegal immigrant can be deported within a week of arrival with no court cases and no messing around. Then the crossings would pretty soon stop.”
The new account comes just months after the Trump administration faced criticism for using the voiceover of a British airline advert to seemingly mock a group of migrants being deported in a tweet on X.
The UK Home Office video was published on the same day that new figures revealed a significant surge in enforcement actions against illegal working in the UK, with both visits to businesses and arrests reaching their highest levels since records began in 2019.
Data indicates that 12,791 visits were conducted in 2025 to establishments such as nail bars, car washes, barbers, and takeaway shops.
This marks a substantial 57 per cent increase from the 8,122 visits recorded in the previous year.
Arrests related to illegal working also hit a record high, with 8,971 individuals apprehended last year – a nearly 59 per cent rise compared to the 5,647 arrests made in 2024, which was previously the highest point in Home Office data.
Of those arrested, 1,087 people have so far been removed from the UK.
It comes as part of a broader effort to crack down on illegal immigration and tackle the threat posed by Reform UK amid surging approval ratings for Nigel Farage’s party.
Home secretary Shabana Mahmood said: ”There is no place for illegal working in our communities.
“That is why we have surged enforcement activity to the highest level in British history so illegal migrants in the black economy have nowhere to hide.
“I will stop at nothing to restore order and control to our borders.”
The Home Office also said visits were up 77% and arrests were up 83% since Labour came to power.
Some 17,483 visits and 12,322 arrests were recorded between July 2024 and December last year, up from 9,894 and 6,725 respectively across January 2023 to June 2024.
Of the arrests, 1,726 people have been returned so far, up 35 per cent on the 1,283 removed from visits in the previous 18-month period.
Among visits by immigration enforcement, officers arrested 13 people at a warehouse in Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex, on November 25 which led to 11 Brazilian and Romanian nationals being detained for removal from the UK.
On December 16, officers arrested 30 Indian and Albanian men at a construction site in Swindon, Wiltshire, the Home Office said, nearly all of whom were detained for removal from the UK, including five released on immigration bail.
Home Office director for enforcement teams, Eddy Montgomery, said: “While this is a great achievement, our activity won’t stop here, we will continue to bear down on this criminality in our towns, cities and villages to ensure there is no hiding place from immigration laws.”
Immigration enforcement was given £5 million to arrest, detain and remove migrants working illegally at sites such as takeaways, beauty salons and car washes.
Officers have also been wearing body-worn cameras since September to help with arrests and prosecutions.
Elsewhere, tighter right-to-work checks have also been introduced under the Government’s new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act, forcing casual, temporary or subcontracted workers to have to prove their status.
Employers who fail to carry out checks could face up to five years in prison, fines of £60,000 for each illegal worker they have employed, and having their business closed.
