Illegal immigrants stow away in agricultural equipment
UK Border Agency officers working at Calais have stopped an attempt by three Vietnamese men to illegally enter the UK by hiding away in a lorry carrying agricultural equipment.
The Romanian registered lorry was selected for a visual search on 11 June 2009 at 9:30am after it aroused the interest of two year-old male English Springer Spaniel, Bracken, a detection dog specially trained to sniff out human beings.
On opening the trailer, UK Border Agency officers found the three Vietnamese hidden among the load. The men were removed, fingerprinted and photographed, refused entry to the UK and handed over to the French authorities.
The lorry carrying the equipment was heading for Luton in Bedfordshire and Driffield and Tadcaster in Yorkshire and was allowed to continue its journey. However, the driver and haulage company could each face a fine of up to £2,000 per clandestine passenger if they are found to have not appropriately secured their load.
Hundreds of UK Border Agency officers based at ports in France and Belgium work 24 hours a day, seven days a week to stop illegal immigrants before they step foot in the UK. In addition to body detection dogs like Bracken, they use carbon dioxide detectors, heartbeat monitors as well as visual searches to find well-hidden stowaways. In 2008, they stopped over 28,000 attempts to enter the UK and searched over a million lorries.
Director of Border Control European Operations, Tom Dowdall, said:
"The UK Border Agency is committed to tackling illegal immigration and its harmful effects. Finds such as these highlight the tenacity required by immigration officers to stay one step ahead in the prevention of illegal immigration.
"This is why we have our own border control checks in France – to try to prevent illegal entrants even setting foot in the UK.
"Combined with hi-tech search equipment and extra powers to combat immigration crime and track down the criminals who bring in the majority of all illegal immigrants we are determined to ensure that only those people the UK needs are able to come here, and those who wish to abuse the rules will be stopped before they travel."
The operation comes at a time of massive reform to the UK’s immigration system. All visas now contain a fingerprint to guard against using a false identity to get to the UK and ID Cards for foreign nationals are being introduced which will help protect against identity fraud and illegal working.
The government is also rolling out an Australian-style points based system for managing migration, ensuring only those with the skills the UK needs are allowed to work.
