A woman living near France’s Channel coast has spoken of her fear after releasing CCTV footage showing groups of migrants in life jackets hurrying past her property as they attempted to reach small boats bound for the UK.
Héloïse Longuet, a 44-year-old mother of two, said her family’s 19th-century farmhouse near Neufchâtel-Hardelot, south of Boulogne-sur-Mer, has found itself at the centre of the small-boat crossings route, with young men staying in nearby unauthorised squats.
The once peaceful stretch of northern France has become a gathering point for people hoping to cross the English Channel, drawn there by smuggling gangs who reportedly charge around £1,000 per person for a place on overcrowded inflatable dinghies heading toward England.
Ms Longuet told Our News Outlet: “The house is a holiday home which we were renovating, but it became surrounded by men trying to get to the beach.
“They congregate outside checking their phones for coordinates supplied by the smugglers, and then they try to get to the beach.
“In fact, there is no direct access to the beach across my land, but that did not stop at least three incursions.”
She said the situation prompted her to install CCTV cameras and warning signs around the property, but claimed makeshift camps soon began appearing in the surrounding woodland.
Ms Longuet said she now feels uneasy visiting the area, particularly because she has two young daughters, and believes support from local police has been limited.
Héloïse Longuet said her 19th-century family farmhouse on the English Channel coast south of Boulogne-sur-Mer, was now surrounded by young men living in illegal squats
The problems have been likened to those experienced by British people who live in areas where mainly male asylum seekers are housed.
‘It is very frightening,’ she said. ‘We see them in the forest, living in very unsanitary conditions. They leave all their rubbish behind.’
Ms Longuet often walked her dog, Maurice, on Hardelot beach, but was dismayed to see it being used by the smugglers more and more.
They switched their departure points from Calais and Dunkirk to a more isolated area which is harder to patrol.
Its wide shoreline allows them to board men, women and children on to inflatable dinghies, with the migrants hiding in sand dunes beforehand.
Last month a man in his 30s died after a small boat capsized off the beach, in a catastrophe which also saw six others, including a toddler, severely injured.
And in May two women died from cardiac arrest after being suffocated on a boat carrying upwards of 80 people that had set off from Hardelot beach.
Fights regularly break out between migrants and gendarmes and riot police, who use tear gas to try to restore order.
Tensions reached boiling point during the summer heatwaves when a series of fires broke out around Hardelot.
‘The situation is appalling, and the dangers are immense, but very little is done about it,’ said Ms Longuet.
‘I do not have Right-wing views, I just want to see the situation improved for everybody, including local residents.’
Ms Longuet met a number of migrants while working as an estate agent, and had an enormous amount of sympathy for them – but not the smugglers who were exploiting them.
She said: ‘Some Afghans were looking for a home after settling in France, and they told me that there had been up to a dozen of them when they set off from their home country.
‘By the time they got to France, only two or three were left, with the others dying on the road. This shows how perilous the situation is.
‘As a mother, I wouldn’t like to imagine the horrors they go through. I pity them.
‘The problem is bigger than domestic politics – it is a global problem which starts in the country which the migrants set off from.
‘In France, the biggest problem is the people smugglers – to them it is a business, and all they are interested in is the money.’
Ms Longuet, who now works in public relations, is permanently based in another part of northern France with her family, and visits to Hardelot beach are becoming a lot less frequent.
Paulette Juilien-Peuvion, mayor of Neufchâtel-Hardelot, said there could be as many as 600 migrants congregating in the town at any one time.
Many residents were complaining about being scared to go out at night, especially in wooded areas.
Ms Juilien-Peuvion said: ‘Some say that, ultimately, these people left everything behind for an adventure – it’s a tragedy. And others say, “We feel unsafe”.
Hardelot beach is on a stretch of coastline that includes Le Touquet, where French president Emmanuel Macron himself owns a holiday home.
He bought it over the past two years with his wife, Brigitte Macron, after she sold another property in the seaside town that had been in her own family for generations.
Despite France’s head of state vacationing in the areas, gangs of migrants from all over world are often seen congregating by railway stations, in commercial centres, and in open countryside.
In turn, French law and order authorities insist that the migrant situation in the area is improving thanks to more robust policing.
Officers have prevented ‘185 small boat crossings’ in the four months since a new Anglo-French agreement was signed in April, pledging some £660million of UK taxpayers’ money to the French, according to an Interior Ministry source in Paris.
Ms Longuet released CCTV of hordes of migrants wearing life jackets rushing past her property near Neufchâtel-Hardelot to catch small boats bound for Britain
Police say they have arrested an increased number of smugglers, and confiscated boats, engines and lifejackets, while deploying a dedicated 50-member riot squad.
Some 15,897 migrants have crossed the Channel so far this year, down 43 per cent on the same time last year, and an 18 per cent drop from the same point in 2024.
This is despite a record 230 people making the journey from France to England in a single boat last month.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said: ‘Our new UK-France deal is already having a real impact, stopping crossings before they happen and disrupting the criminal gangs behind them.
‘People smugglers should be in no doubt, we’re taking down their operations, seizing their equipment and breaking their business model for good.
‘Through our joint work with France, we have stopped over 47,000 small boat crossing attempts since the election and we will not let up.’
