Undercover migrant exposes just how easy it is to buy small boat ticket to UK
EXCLUSIVE: Shocking findings from an undercover Express investigation reveal the inner workings of French migrant camps
An undercover Express investigation has revealed the shocking speed illegal migrants can secure a small boat crossing to England. Our undercover reporter was given the number of a fixer just 20 minutes after arriving at a French migrant camp. Despite the UK handing over £662 million to put an end to the crisis, he was sitting face-to-face with a group of Kurdish people smugglers within two hours to negotiate a price.
“I was surprised how easy it was,” the undercover reporter said, “It was so quick to find a smuggler who was slapping my chest and telling me he could bring me to England.”
Our undercover reporter spent a day observing the camp. He returned the next day posing as a migrant with a criminal record seeking to reach the UK by dinghy. Within 20 minutes of arriving, he found a middle man, who claimed he was getting a free ride to Britain in exchange for piloting a dinghy, to arrange a crossing.
Our reporter was able to infiltrate the ruthless leadership that controls the sprawling camp on the outskirts of Dunkirk. The gang almost immediately offered him a spot on a small boat to England for a knockdown fee of £1,500, provided he paid in cash “on the beach.”
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“We will give you a tent,” a smuggler in a black beanie hat told him after cutting the deal. “[Follow] my people and after I will speak to you.”
Rather than hiding their exploits, the Kurdish gang operates entirely out in the open. As well as the smuggling operation, it runs a makeshift market set up next to charity outreach tents. There, men connected to the ring openly sell illegal drugs, food, water, and dangerously substandard lifejackets to migrants desperate to cross the Channel.
UK taxpayer-funded law enforcement is well aware of the market. While our undercover reporter was in the camp, at least 10 vanloads of French police officers arrived on site. However, instead of targeting the smugglers, they focused on dismantling the tents.
This clearance - one of many destroying makeshift homes across the region that day - left hundreds of migrants without shelter just as weather conditions on the Channel became favourable for a crossing. With no one actually arrested or detained during the police operation, the camp and the market were entirely rebuilt by the same afternoon.
After our undercover reporter found how easy it was to arrange a crossing, the Express team arrived at the camp to confront the traffickers directly. The smugglers made little effort to hide their faces from the cameras when challenged, calmly walking between the tents in the market.
They refused to answer questions about what the Express had found and then a crowd of men connected to the ring began hurling rocks and bottles. Our men also found all the same illicit activities brazenly continuing as if the police clearance had never happened.
On camera, one drug dealer casually admitted to selling illicit substances, while lifejacket merchants spoke without remorse about making vast profits on safety gear explicitly labelled as unsafe for sea use.
The team asked three charity workers from Afeji, who were slumped in plastic chairs right beside the Kurdish market, why nothing was being done to stop the exploitation. They refused to speak. We presented our findings to the French National Police, which referred us to the regional division, but they too declined to comment on the basis it wasn't their responsibility. The general directorate has also been contacted for comment.
Afeji Charity has been repeatedly contacted for comment. Shadow home secretary Chris Philp said: “It’s clear from this investigation that the French police are not going after the people smugglers as they should be.
“The Government should make it clear that we won’t be paying a penny to the French Government until they agree to substantially increase their prevention rate and start intercepting at sea by force – as they promised last summer.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are determined to investigate and lock up vile people smugglers. The National Crime Agency has over 100 live investigations, and arrests, convictions and seizures up by nearly 50% this year. The Home Secretary's landmark deal with France is also improving our joint efforts to put people smugglers behind bars that led to 480 smugglers arrested in 2025, while building on the over 42,000 migrants stopped from crossing the channel since the election.”
