Balaclava-wearing vigilantes want to flood the English Channel with their own small boats in an effort to physically block migrants entering the UK illegally via mega-dinghies.
The only problem? They can’t get their hands on any boats.
Daniel Thomas, a known associate of Tommy Robinson who was banned from France after slashing abandoned dinghies on French beaches last year, outlined his plan to put “50 boats” in the Channel and lock down the Port of Dover three months ago.
So far, the architect of the weekend’s asylum seeker clashes has used donations from his social media supporters to buy one small boat, already a downsize from a much larger boat he had hoped to acquire, called “the Cheeky Girl”.
The fishing boat he did buy was purchased on 17 April, shortly before Robinson’s anti-migrant march in London in May. The Dusky boat, imaginatively renamed “the Patriot”, was badly damaged after one trip to sea under Thomas’ captainage. A video posted on 25 August showed Thomas showing the boat is no longer seaworthy and “was under water for quite a while”, with a number of large visible cracks.
