The next election will be fought and lost on small boats – but not in the way you imagine

It is going to be very difficult for Rishi Sunak to make boats equal votes, writes Andrew Grice

Senior Tories expect Suella Braverman to find a pretext – probably on immigration – to resign (Getty/PA)

Net migration to the UK will rise to a record level when official figures are published next Thursday, up from 504,000 to more than 700,000 a year. There have been reports the figure could rocket to 1 million, but the suspicion at Westminster is that this might have more to do with expectation management than reality.

In the margins of the G7 summit in Japan on Friday, Rishi Sunak sought to avoid talking about legal migration, repeatedly trying to divert his media interviews to the illegal variety of people crossing the Channel in small boats.

No wonder: when the 2019 Tory manifesto pledged to reduce immigration, the annual net figure stood at 226,000. Sunak said legal migration is “too high” but declined to set a target or timescale for bringing it down, knowing the Tories have failed woefully to achieve their previous goals.