The Border Ledger

How to use this

Plain English

  1. 1. Names. Politicians, judges and mayors. Open a file for one sentence, then the acts, then the votes.
  2. 2. Money. Home Office, councils, NHS trusts, legal aid, Defra and the charities they pay. A grant table you can search.
  3. 3. Votes. Six statutes. Who in this ledger backed tighter rules, and who blocked them.
  4. 4. Timeline. 1997 to 2026, in order.

This is a ledger of public power, not a criminal charge. “Invasion” is the word a former Home Secretary used for Channel crossings. Mass legal migration is a separate, larger fact. Both are in the numbers.

People are here if they held high office, whipped the key votes, issued a binding judgment, ran a sanctuary city, signed the cheques, or cashed them. Conservatives who promised control and delivered 944,000 are here. So is Labour’s repeal of Rwanda. So are Migrant Help and the Refugee Council.

Councils, NHS trusts, Defra, the Environment Agency and the FSA are here because their accounts sit on the same circuit: grants and tariffs to the charity layer that houses, advises and litigates. Defra’s £13.6 million food grants are not a Channel contract. They still feed the destitution network. EA and FSA are the thinner end — no AIRE-scale deal found. The main tap is the Home Office, local government, the NHS and legal aid.

Vote colours: “Blocked it” means they voted against a tightening bill. “Opened it” means they voted for the Human Rights Act. n/a means they were not in that House.

ONS revises migration figures. Peak 944,000 is year ending March 2023. Small boats are Home Office detections. NAO: £4.0 billion asylum support in 2024–25. Charity audit totals are Charlotte Gill’s published running tally, cited as such.

Open the money page

Sources