The last recorded arrivals were on 14 November.

It is the lowest uninterrupted run since autumn 2018.

So far, 39,292 people have crossed to the UK aboard small boats this year - already more than any other year except 2022.

The record that year was set at 45,774 arrivals.

It comes as the government has stepped up efforts in recent months to deter people from risking their lives crossing the Channel - but measures are not expected to have an impact until next year.

December is normally one of the quietest for Channel crossings, with a combination of poor visibility, low temperatures, less daylight and stormy weather making the perilous journey more difficult.

The most arrivals recorded in the month of December is 3,254, in 2024.

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In a televised address, Charles said his "good news" was "thanks to early diagnosis, effective intervention and adherence to doctors' orders".

"This milestone is both a personal blessing and a testimony to the remarkable advances that have been made in cancer care in recent years," he added.

"Testimony that I hope may give encouragement to the 50% of us who will be diagnosed with the illness at some point in our lives."

The King announced in February 2024 that he had been diagnosed with cancer and was beginning treatment.

The monarch postponed all public-facing engagements, but continued with his duties as head of state behind palace walls, conducting audiences and Privy Council meetings.

He returned to public duties in April last year and visited University College Hospital Macmillan Cancer Centre in central London with the Queen and discussed his "shock" at being diagnosed when he spoke to a fellow cancer patient.

Sources suggested last December his treatment would continue in 2025 and was "moving in a positive direction".

The King has chosen not to reveal what kind of cancer he has been treated for. Palace sources have partly put that down to the fact that he doesn't want one type of cancer to appear more significant or attract more attention than others.

In a statement after the speech aired, a Buckingham Palace spokesperson said: "His Majesty has responded exceptionally well to treatment and his doctors advise that ongoing measures will now move into a precautionary phase."

Sir Keir Starmer praised the video message as "a powerful message," and said: "I know I speak for the entire country when I say how glad I am that his cancer treatment will be reduced in the new year.

"Early cancer screening saves lives."

Early detection can give 'the precious gift of hope'

His message on Friday was broadcast at 8pm in support of Stand Up To Cancer, a joint campaign by Cancer Research UK and Channel 4.

In an appeal to people to get screened for the disease early, the King said: "I know from my own experience that a cancer diagnosis can feel overwhelming.

"Yet I also know that early detection is the key that can transform treatment journeys, giving invaluable time to medical teams - and, to their patients, the precious gift of hope. These are gifts we can all help deliver."

Charles noted that "at least nine million people in our country are not up to date with the cancer screenings available to them," adding: "That is at least nine million opportunities for early diagnosis being missed.

"The statistics speak with stark clarity. To take just one example: When bowel cancer is caught at the earliest stage, around nine in ten people survive for at least five years.

"When diagnosed late, that falls to just one in ten. Early diagnosis quite simply saves lives."

Minor inconvenience of screening 'a small price to pay'

The King acknowledged that people often avoid screening "because they imagine it may be frightening, embarrassing or uncomfortable". But, he added: "If and when they do finally take up their invitation, they are glad they took part.

"A few moments of minor inconvenience are a small price to pay for the reassurance that comes for most people when they are either told either they don't need further tests, or, for some, are given the chance to enable early detection, with the life-saving intervention that can follow."

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Giving his "most heartfelt thanks" to doctors, nurses, researchers and charity workers, the King added: "As I have observed before, the darkest moments of illness can be illuminated by the greatest compassion. But compassion must be paired with action.

"This December, as we gather to reflect on the year past, I pray that we can each pledge, as part of our resolutions for the year ahead, to play our part in helping to catch cancer early.

"Your life - or the life of someone you love - may depend upon it."

In August, around 50,000 people demonstrated in towns and cities across the country. There were clashes at separate rallies between far-right and far-left protesters in Melbourne.

In October, there were more protests. This time police accused the far left of attacking officers and trying to confront right-wing protesters.

Tension on both sides is running high.

Sydney protester Fran Grant has attended all the rallies.

"I love Australia and I'm not happy with what's happening now," she explained.

"It looks like the Labour government are continuing to bring in immigrants. I have no problem with that if we have the infrastructure to support it, but we don't."

Migration levels now falling

During the COVID crisis, Australia introduced strict border closures and migration plummeted.

Then, in the years following the pandemic, there was a migration boom. A total of 1.4 million people entered Australia.

These were huge numbers. However, the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows net overseas migration has since fallen by almost 40% since its post-COVID peak.

But many Australians still believe the numbers are still too high.

'We can't keep going like this'

Australia's multicultural heart is in suburbs like Auburn in Sydney, where almost 80% of families use a language other than English at home.

Steve Christou is a Cumberland City councillor and the son of Greek-Cypriot migrants.

"All we're saying is put a stop to excess immigration until the country's infrastructure can keep up," he said. "We can't keep going like this."

He added: "We're not blaming the migrants in the country, let's be very clear about that. The government is being blamed for letting in 1.4 million migrants in the last three years to the point where the country can't cope."

Mr Christou spoke to protesters at the rally in October. There were families, students and seniors in the crowd, flying Australian flags and singing Australian songs.

Critics have called these protests racist, inflammatory and dangerous, but many people attending said they were there to show their pride for Australia and its way of life.

Others were demonstrating against the country's housing shortage and the increasing cost of living.

Australia's neo-Nazis emboldened

In August, dozens of Australia's neo-Nazis also attended the Melbourne and Sydney protests and addressed the crowds.

In Melbourne, migration demonstrations and counter-protests turned violent. Neo-Nazis allegedly attacked an indigenous camp in the city.

Speaking at an anti-racism rally in Sydney, deputy leader of the Australian Greens, Mehreen Faruqi, told Sky News: "The far right are emboldened in a way that I have never seen before."

Senator Faruqi was born in Pakistan but has lived in Australia for more than 30 years.

"They [far right] are coming out on the streets, they have signs and slogans and chants that are white supremacists, white nationalists, and of course, this is happening across the world."

Terrorism and far-right expert, Dr Josh Roose, from Deakin University in Melbourne, said: "We know that the Nazis see this as their time to capitalise.

"They're not only attending these rallies, but they're seeking to position themselves at the front, to mobilise people and shape the public conversation by normalising extreme ideas."

At the "March for Australia" rally in October, organiser Bec "Freedom" told Sky News that the neo-Nazis are "proud Australians .. standing up for our country against mass immigration. So long as they're not violent, they're welcome here.

"While they're at my event, they've been told to keep it respectful. No hate speech, no violence, no Hitler talk," she said.

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Ms Freedom said she's "definitely not" coordinating with the neo-Nazis, that she has spoken with them and "that's as far as it goes".

Asked if she was worried that the presence of the neo-Nazis at the August rally would give the March for Australia movement a bad name, she replied: "The thing is we've been abused, and name-called by the media for so long… If you want to call me a Nazi, then fine, call me a Nazi."

Other demonstrators said they wanted nothing to do with the neo-Nazis and had no time for the group and its messages.

On 8 November, more than 60 neo-Nazis gathered on the steps of the New South Wales state parliament, holding a banner reading "Abolish the Jewish Lobby".

The brazen stunt shocked the public and was widely condemned by the state government.

The government is now strengthening laws against public displays of neo-Nazi ideology.

A bill to ban the burqa

There's been political controversy too.

In November, Australian senator and leader of the far-right One Nation party, Pauline Hanson, created a political storm when she wore a burqa (a full-face Islamic covering) inside federal parliament.

Ms Hanson is calling for the burqa to be banned in public places. Her party is rising in the polls and drawing disaffected Coalition (or Conservative) voters to its ranks.

At home with Fran Grant and her reptiles

Ms Grant's home is where she can really express her pride in Australia.

She has an Australian flag flying out the front, an Australian-map-shaped coffee, and a collection of native goannas and snakes.

Ms Grant said being born in Australia, she's won the "lottery of life" but believes there are too many "economic migrants" coming in.

"I'm very happy for people to come here. My mum was a 10-pound pom (British migrant)," she explained.

"At the moment where the cost of living and housing is so high, instead of just saying 'racism, racism' let's look at what's best for people who live here now."

The commanders were designated on Friday after documented atrocities committed by RSF troops in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.

Deputy commander Abdul Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, the brother of RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan "Hemedti" Dagalo, is among four commanders of the paramilitary group that will face asset freezes and travel bans. Hemedti himself is not on the list of sanctions.

El Fasher was captured by the RSF on 26 October after an 18-month siege against the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). The RSF co-ordinated a campaign of enforced starvation, shelling and drone strikes with widespread civilian casualties.

In September, Sky News travelled to North Darfur and reported on volunteers being killed and arrested by the RSF for attempting to smuggle food and medicine into the city at the height of the siege. Food smuggling co-ordinators told us they had no choice but to try to save the city from "a slow genocide".

Other volunteers pleaded with us to urge the world to save Darfur and condemned the "inhumanity" of the global apathy. Many of the people we met in North Darfur lost loved ones to the RSF's violent takeover of the city.

After the capture of El Fasher, sometimes spelled Al Fashir, RSF fighters filmed themselves killing civilians in the fields around the city as they attempted to flee.

A Sky News investigation with Lighthouse Reports and Sudan War Monitor revealed that hundreds of civilians were rounded up in school yards in a town bordering the road out of the city.

A survivor told us they were forced to bury with their own hands fellow captives who were killed by the RSF on the basis of ethnicity. Satellite images analysed by Sky News found that an existing cemetery in Gurnei was extended in the days that followed 26 October, corresponding with testimony of new burials.

Yale Humanitarian Labs analysed high-resolution satellite imagery from the streets of El Fasher in the days after the RSF capture. Their analysis showed objects in the streets that correspond with corpses and large red-coloured stains likely to be blood. A civilian who escaped the slaughter told us they were stepping over bodies on their way out of the city.

An RSF insider said that at least 7,000 people were killed by their troops in the first five days of capture and that sanctioned RSF deputy commander Abdul Rahim Dagalo commanded the entire operation. Celebratory footage shared by the RSF shows him in the city only hours after it fell.

In a document naming the sanctioned individuals, the UK government said Dagalo was responsible for engaging in, supporting, or promoting "serious violations of international humanitarian law in Sudan".

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These "grave breaches" comprise "the mass killings of civilians; ethnically targeted executions; sexual violence, including gang rape; abductions for ransom; widespread arbitrary detentions; and attacks on health facilities, medical staff and humanitarian workers".

Also sanctioned was major general Osman Mohamed Hamid Mohamed, the head of the RSF's Operations Department, as well as brigadier general Al-Fateh Abdullah Idris and field commander Tijani Ibrahim Moussa Mohamed.

The RSF has been battling the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) for control of Sudan since April 2023. The paramilitary group held the capital Khartoum for two years before it was recaptured by the army in March.

Fighting pivoted to Darfur as the RSF tightened its siege on El Fasher and massacred the nearby Zamzam displacement camp before closing in on the city.

The epicentre of the war has now shifted to three fronts in the southwest Kordofan, threatening to tear Sudan into two.

The RSF has made recent gains; seizing the key city of Babanusa in West Kordofan - a railway city that connects the west, east, south and north of the country - and the oil-rich town of Heglieg on the border with Sudan's South Kordofan State and South Sudan.

Yellow weather warnings for rain have been issued by the Met Office for the west of Scotland, Northern Ireland, parts of western Wales, and northwest England, with Scotland's alert until Sunday and the rest until Monday.

Check the forecast where you are

A more serious amber warning will be in effect in Cumbria from 6am on Sunday to 6pm on Monday, where the agency said more than 200mm of rain "is possible in some locations".

The Met Office said "fast flowing or deep floodwater is likely, causing danger to life", and "homes and businesses are likely to be flooded, causing damage to some buildings".

Jonathan Day, Environment Agency flood duty manager, said the likely heavy rain in Cumbria "means significant river and surface water flooding impacts are probable" and "are also possible more widely".

He added that the agency's teams "are out on the ground, taking action to reduce the impact of flooding and support those communities affected".

"We urge people not to drive through flood water - it is often deeper than it looks and just 30cm of flowing water is enough to float your car," he also said.

Floods minister Emma Hardy also urged people in affected areas to follow local advice, sign up for flood warnings, and stay up to date with the latest information.

According to the Met Office, some areas of northwest England will continue to see showers until late Monday afternoon, while elsewhere, the southern half of the UK will be dry and bright, with much lighter winds.

Cloudless skies, patches of frost, mist and fog are expected in the south of England on Saturday morning, and Sunday is set to stay dry for many.

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There will be more clouds, followed by the band of rain, slowly moving southeast through Sunday night and into Monday.

Sky's weather producer Kirsty McCabe reports that the "unsettled and mostly mild theme will continue for a while yet, but southern parts could escape with a mainly fine weekend".

She said: "It'll be windy in the north too, with coastal gales likely, locally severe. Temperatures will be mostly above average, but where skies remain clear overnight, frost and fog are possible."

Ms McCabe also noted that "high pressure is likely to build in the run up to Christmas - so it could be colder, drier and more settled".