Home Office achieves record deportation numbers in single flight

A record number of Nigerians and Ghanaians were deported from Britain on Friday, according to the Home Office.

In total, 44 were deported to their home countries on a solitary flight from Gatwick Airport.

The deportation was part of a “major surge” by the Home Office and is the latest significant deportation since the General Election.

Since taking office, Labour has returned 3,600 people to various countries, including about 200 to Brazil and 46 to Vietnam and Timor-Leste.

The eastern European states of Albania, Lithuania and Romania have also taken back nationals arriving from UK deportation flights.

Deportations to Nigeria and Ghana are quite rare – only four have been recorded since 2020, according to the Guardian.

The last four flights had six, seven, 16 and 21 people on them respectively. This latest flight had almost as many people on it as the previous four flights combined.

The Guardian says it spoke to Nigerians being held near Gatwick Airport prior to their deportation. The outlet claims one person they spoke to had tried to commit suicide.

Another, the outlet reports, said: “I’ve been in the UK for 15 years as an asylum seeker. I have no criminal record but the Home Office has refused my claim.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “We have already begun delivering a major surge in immigration enforcement and returns activity to remove people with no right to be in the UK and ensure the rules are respected and enforced, with over 3,600 returned in the first two months of the new government.”