Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her department holds an estimate of the number of criminals in the UK that arrived in the country by irregular means.

The information you have requested regarding the number of foreign criminals in the UK who arrived by irregular means is not available from published statistics.

However, foreign nationals who commit crime should be in no doubt that the law will be enforced and, where appropriate, we will pursue their deportation.

The latest published information shows that in the year-ending October 2025, 5,430 foreign national offenders (FNOs) were returned, which is an increase of 12% compared to the number of FNO returns in the same period 12 months prior.