The number of people returned from the UK has reached its highest level in nearly a decade, according to provisional Home Office figures, with 80,286 enforced and voluntary returns recorded between 1 July 2024 and 31 July 2026.

Of those, 19,622 were enforced returns of people with no legal right to remain in the UK, while 11,733 involved foreign national offenders and 24,471 were asylum-related returns. A further 6,103 were people who had arrived by small boat.

In the latest 12 months covered by the figures, to the end of July 2026, there were 39,690 returns in total, up 5% on the previous year, including 9,679 enforced returns. Foreign national offender returns reached 5,928, up 11%.

The figures come from a Home Office note on returns since July 2024, which also records 91 charter flights operated to countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and South America between August 2025 and July 2026.

The Home Office’s Immigration System Statistics for the year ending June 2026 tell a similar story, recording 40,605 returns, made up of 9,669 enforced returns and 30,936 voluntary returns. The Home Office does not publish deportations as a separate figure; deportations are counted within enforced returns.

Removals remain difficult in practice. Legal barriers include Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which bans return to a risk of torture or inhuman treatment, and Article 8, which protects family and private life. Missing documents, countries that refuse to take their citizens back and a shortage of detention places also slow the process, while the immigration tribunal had about 156,000 open appeals at the end of June 2026, with asylum appeals taking 72 weeks on average to clear.