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UKBA's weekend of scandals - But are the lessons being learnt?
First it was the discovery that officials at Heathrow had, on a few occasions, suspended some of the checks they are required to perform on non-EU nationals arriving in the UK. Then there was the news that UKBA teams are illegally targeting bus passengers travelling between UK cities for immigration checks.
Then, to cap off a really bad week, we get the news that an Agency official working at its national headquarters in Croydon is to be prosecuted for taking bribes to issue visas. Under the Labour government blunders of this sort came singularly and only once every several months, so perhaps we should at least commend the coalition government for increasing UKBA’s productivity rate.
For close observers of the UK’s immigration policies (and in MRN we have people who've been doing that for 30+ years) this sort of stuff comes as no surprise. Controlling the movement of people in the conditions of our modern world is an inherently difficult task. Around 100 million people enter the UK every year and UKBA is required to check the travel documents of each and every one of these. True, in any one year only around one-fifth of these will actually be subject to the full measure of immigration control measures, but those who are still have to be sorted out from all the rest.
Governments like to think that they can stay ahead of the game by bringing all sorts of high-tech kit into border control procedures and it looks forward to reporting continuous improvements to a public which so often seems rattled by stories of systems failure. The problem is that much of this stuff is very expensive and doesn’t work properly in any case, as the National Audit Office report on IT procurement and governance in immigration controls recently reminded us. Paying for it also means even greater pressure to reduce expenditure on the engagement of staff than is felt in the rest of the public sector, with personnel reductions having already dropped by 10% since 2010, and expected to fall by another 20% over the next few years.
Meanwhile UK ports of entry seethe with passengers frustrated with long delays at the passport checking desks, with every minute spent in queues doing damage to the county’s image as a pleasant and enjoyable place to visit.
Torn by the conflicting pressures of controlling immigration and facilitating the efficient movement of people across borders it is not surprising to discover that officials will be tempted on occasion to cut back on some of the checks which are laborious and unproductive in identifying significant levels of risk to the integrity of the overall system. This appears to be what the now suspended border chief Brodie Clark did when he permitted staff at Heathrow to relax some of the checking procedures on some passengers who entered the UK during the summer.
The Home Secretary has asked the Independent Chief Inspector of the UKBA, John Vine to investigate the matter and more detail will emerge from that process. Some of the more lurid speculations, which have included those of the Home Affairs Select Committee chairman, Keith Vaz MP, have suggested that ‘hundreds of thousands’ of people were admitted during this period without being checked.
This seems unlikely. Our suspicion is that immigration officers dealing with relatively small numbers of people travelling on what are considered to be low-risk routes from places like North America or Japan were permitted to forego the necessity of double-checking identity papers. All of these passengers will, we expect, prove to have had their paper documents examined, with only scanning of embedded microchips forgone for the sake of greater speed.
If this is the case, the salient question which the Chief Inspector, should be invited to address, is not how many cases avoided such double-checking procedures, but what was the extent of the risk that people who would otherwise have been refused entry managed to get into the country? Never mind talk of hundreds of thousands, is the really important number likely to crawl as high as the double-digit tens?
But all the flapping about Mr Brodie Clark’s difficulties has saved the more extreme control freaks who occupy senior positions in the coalition government from the real scandal of the UKBA clearly exceeding its authority by imposing immigration control checks on people travelling on intercity bus services in the UK. The case in question involved buses arriving at Liverpool’s Norton Street coach station, which are apparently regularly boarded by a UKBA officers acting in pairs who require passengers to produce passports as evidence of identity.
According to a report in the Observer, a Mr Pete Clark described how he and others were physically blocked from leaving a National Express coach travelling to the city from Leeds until the passengers revealed identification "deemed suitable." The Observer quotes him as saying:
"None of the persons involved gave an explanation of who they were, what they were doing and on which authority." In his view, "Their attempt to prevent passengers from going about their lawful business amounts to harassment."
The UKBA claims that these are ‘intelligence-led’ operations. In the context of raids carried out on residential or business premises, this term is taken to mean that the teams involved have reasonable grounds to believe that named individuals known to be in breach of immigration regulations are present. A recent report by the Independent Chief Inspector on the work of UKBA Arrest Teams operating in the London Boroughs of Bexley, Greenwich and Lambeth makes it clear that a transparent audit trail of intelligence is required in the case of each operation which details of the suspected offenders who are the object of such activity.
The Border Agency needs to be pressed as to whether such an audit trail exists in the case of the checks on bus passengers. They are needed to prevent the abuse and oppressive use of immigration control powers and to safeguard the rights of people who are likely to be intimidated by such demands for documentation. It would be helpful if the Chief Inspector could use his office to establish the position in relation to these bus checks.
How does the story about corrupt officials in the UKBA headquarter offices fit into this picture? The answer is that this type of opportunistic criminality gains a foothold in administrative systems which are overstretched by demands being placed on them by the higher authorities and the scarcity of the resources needed to do the job. At the soft end of the spectrum, officials will calculate the risk involved in suspending aspects of the operation they are required to carry out in order to present a generally pleasing picture of the work they are doing to their political bosses. The problem Mr Brodie Clark and his suspended colleagues now face is not that any clear evidence of harm will arise from their actions, but merely that the whistle was blown on them and their minister was embarrassed by it all.
In our view the passport checks imposed on inter-city bus passengers involves a more insidious and damaging level of harm. It is likely the UKBA has no legal authority to conduct such checks. This action involves oppressive activities directed against members of the public who, even when their status is legal, still often feel insecure because of the high chance that their circumstances will be misinterpreted by unsympathetic officials.
This all leads to the gross danger of outright corruption at the heart of the system. When public policy is as poorly designed as the UK’s immigration procedures, and when high ranking officials can only make the system work by banging it into shape with blunt instruments, then the spaces and the gaps for fraud and bribery will be opened up and widened. That is exactly the position we are in today and it perfectly links the stories of the suspended checks at Heathrow, the illegal checks on inter-city buses, and the dodgy shenanigans at UKBA’s Lunar House.
It’s much bigger than poor Mr Clark, Mrs May. For heaven’s sake, sort it out!
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Comments
It's obvious, really, which leads to the next question: what's stopping them learning the lesson? The answer might be a blind determination to separate "us" from "them". Having conquered the world, there is, now, the thought that "we" must be separate from the world.
These types of scandals prove the point that the system works just fine until people get involved. This is why measured reviews and changes should be implemented within immigration rather than sweeping works and constant flip-flops which cause system upheaval and open the door wide for misuse and corruption.
I believe it has taken this long for these items to come to light because they've done so much to the system since 2010 that people didn't have the time or resources to notice. Part of me cheers this on because in my opinion it has all been too much, too fast, too soon. Lets have a sensible discussion about immigration in light of all this mess!
"Are the lessons being learnt?"
The UKBA will never learn from its mistakes until there is a proper independent complaints system that takes complaints about the UKBA seriously. At present anyone who has made a complaint will tell you (Including me) that they basically protect their own (no independence) and do not dealing with complaints seriously. They won't even answer fundamental questions about a case.
John Vine has certainly done a thorough and extensive check on the UK Immigration system and mainly found it wanting (not fit for purpose) He has advised of good, effective ways of cutting error, and improving decision making processes to get it right first time. The UKBA has basically done very little about the reports, except justify its "incompetance" with waffle and excuses on its website. As a result the poor immigration decisions continue.
Then there is the complete disregard for the "Rule of law".
COA, Marriage Visa age, EC38, Metock, and even the latest implementation of an ECJ case of Zambrano (Para 10 & 19 of the internal policy guidance).
the U.K.B.A will never learn from their mistakes as a British national i was detained for 14 mounths because i hit an immigration officer but was never sent to prison pending them revockeineg my nationality but after 14 mounths in detention and them trying to every country the can get hold of i was released without no condition and was given my passport back now i have a compensation case against the U.K.B.A i have won it once and they made an appeal we are still waiting for out comes of their appeal
I think the whole ethos of the UKBA is that 'we can and will be able to do and get away with what we please'!
The reason is the UKBA has a Home Secretary. Immigration Minister and Prime Minister in post who have the same idiological disregard for British Human Rights as the Nazis developed in pre war Germany.
They went ahead with their idiology regardless and completely unchallenged!
They see themselves as superior and self justify their extremism.
Certain of the British press, especially the 'popular press'', actually incite racism by misreporting the facts and misleading the population at large.
Discrimation and racism are 'illegal' but widely practised by a UK Coalition Government that professes democracy yet fails to practice it.
They are 'blind' to their own dirty doings and a British public who fail to see that one act of discrimination and racism against just one person is the thin end of the wedge against all!
Don's right, the bus passenger checks are by far the worst story to engulf the Border Agency this weekend. Since there is no requirement to carry any form of identity document in this country, presumably the majority of passengers - without proof of nationality or immigration status - are suspects and briefly detained. I'd be very surprised if the UKBA officials detain the ones who look or sound British for long, so they've inevitably created a discriminatory check. "Intelligence-led" - this is particularly laughable. Did somebody have the bright idea that foreigners are poorer and consequently more likely to use inter-city bus services?
Labour's response is a disgrace. Scaremongering and pushing for strengthening border regime.
I'm afraid you are right David. I've just spent an hour watching Theresa May's statement to Parliament and the ensuing debate. The new Labour spokesperson on immigration, Chris Bryant, made an absurd, overhyped intervention claiming the government had allowed 'hundreds of thousands to just waltz in with out so much as a by-your-leave'. With the honourable exception of Jeremy Corbyn, and perhaps one or two others, no mention was made of the collapse of all semblance of rational order at Heathrow in particular during the summer, which led to queues for passport checks in some cases 4 hours long. We are being very badly served by the dreadful state of the discussion about immigration policy in Parliament and the media.
At least in Nazi Germany, everyone knows what was going on .
I really do feel sorry for my children.
UKBA the most corrupt agency in Britain under the control of one of the most corrupt Governments in the world UK!!!!!!!!!!! Im British im ashamed to say however im clever enough to have lived out the country for the last 35 years and the next 35!!!!! I visit once in a while only to see how worse it gets! Over taxed under Cameron can you guys get any worse?????
Geronimo I couldnt agree more!
In fact I dont disagree with all that has been said.
I do however feel desperately sad for all the unaccompanied minors that we are sending back to places of danger on a regular basis every week and who currently for many, who have no-one to fight for and with them, are subjected to the most iunhumane of treatment at the hands of the homophobic, racist, misogynistic people who for the most part make up our so called immigration system, it makes me ashamed to be British and as a mother I am incensed by the collective actions of two governments both Labour and Conservative who have both used the statistics and the inherent racism that exists within society for their own political agendas.
When you have to stand and watch 5 big burly men all ukba officials man handle your daughter, who poses NO THREAT to anyone into the back fo a waiting meat wagon and then for her to be placed into a police cell and to be denied access then the questions this brings into my mind about a "Caring Society" in fact the so called "Big Society" leave me cold!
We are still fighting for my daughter to have leave to remain here and I have no faith in this cold heartless, incompetent and cruel system!
Regardless, we must maintain the belief that these people (Theresa May etc) remain a minority and that the vast majority of the country remains committed to honesty, justice and fairness.
Not sure I go for that one Denis! At best it is hopeful at worst it can lead us into a false sense of security that all is well when it so obviously isn't!
They've probably chosen Liverpool because of the further submissions unit there. They thought it would be easy to catch all asylum seekers who applied before 2007 and have had their claims refused who are trying to make a fresh claim. They all have to go there in person. Intelligence-led?
Interesting point European Citizen. Has anyone anything to report about checks on inter-city buses from other areas of the country
There was a UKBA progam on TV a few weeks back where UKBA staff were setting up the same checks outside Stratford Station in east London. They did catch a couple of guys and it was all done 'nicely niceley' in front of a camera. But with no camera and not for public viewing I feel sure its not done in the same manner.
Those "more extreme control freaks" (who occupy senior positions in the coalition government) are the concern. Will they learn? Meanwhile, we maintain faith in the honesty and integrity of other folk.
Hi Jacx,
Sorry to hear about your daughters experience. I hope everything works out o.k.
It is unfortunate that the GUTTER PRESS in this country has been allowed to propagate neo nazi ideologies in UK which is very shameful and can have a very detrimental effect on this beloved country in futrure.
Lets just hope our politicians step back and think about the damage they are doing to human beings from their former colonies.
Thanks Michael,
I know what u mean about the gutter press, as for our MP's stepping back sometimes I think they are as misinformed as the press and it is up to us to educate them!
the Conservative MP in our area had NO IDEA about how much revenue migrants to the UK generate for the economy and that far from "taking our jobs" which is in itself a crock of s***, they actually create jobs for British people instead, he had no idea out this and yet still he got elected in our area and I have no doubts that he like many others at times played the immigration card, it is their joker in the pack cos the figures the bandy about are just untrue.
Rant over folks!
Jacx
Folks I have been following this situation since Jan 2011 when my non EU wife who had been living in the UK with me on a 27 month visa was refused a new visa by UKBA.
I have approached my MP who strung me along until June 2011. I have read and tagged every piece of Home Ofiice / UKBA in every publication I can find. I am in touch with others.
My conclusion is that all MPs of all parties know exactly whats going on but are toeing party lines and pleading ignorance as their cop out! Don't be fooled by any of them!
But now the rift in the UKBA with the Home Secretary is good news for us. We wait results.
Second on another MRN website is a report of a book just published on how the press is shaping and influencing both public and government opinions on immigration.
I see this as good at the time of the Leveson inquiry on the press and the undue influence of some press barons to influence public and government policy. British people should have accurate information and be allowed to reach their own conclusion.
My next door neighbours now point out to me the news on what they now know to be a corrupt inefficient incompetent 'not fit for purpose' UKBA! We hope truth will out. The old saying you can fool some of the people some of the time but not all of the people all of the time is true. We wait to see the fate of Moggy May who may yet fly off on her broom stick!
Geronimo try Fadiga and Co in London, especially Hani Zubeidi he is our solicitor and a national treasure who works tirelessly for people like us caught up in an unfair and inhumane asylum system! Feel free to mention that Jacqui recommmended him to you and good luck! Jacx
Hello Jacx thanks for your information I note your advice. I have just been emailing another friend in the same situation I will pass your information onto him as well. His MP is Sir George Young Leader of the House and he has asked just where is the justice let alone common sense in what May has been doing. We wait and see. keep in touch and thanks.
Hi Jacx,
Thanks. Its not that your MP does not know all these facts. Its just that politics as they say, is a dirty game. It is much easier to attack migrants and blame them for all the ills of the society than to have a plan for job creation and regeneration of the economy, thats tough.
So the most vulnerable such as disabled, unemployed,youths, migrants have to be blamed.
The pity is that UK is squandering a lot of goodwill.
What a shame.
Ironically, you can see the contrast in the welcome the people of TANZANIA gave to Prince Charles and Camila.
I hope one day that kind of reception will not be a thing of the past, hope not.
But deliberate stigmatisation of minorites is how totalitarian govts. usualy start.
Why not just give migrants preferential treatment? Oh, we're already doing that, never mind.
Mr David Sanderson I don't know where you get your information from but I suspect the so called popular press. Perhaps if you knew little more, the truth, by first hand information you would be more objective.
The migrants many of us refer to are in fact the spouses of respectable taxpaying self supporting British nationals, like myself, who own our own homes receive no state aid and live normal lives.
But we British citizens have been denied our HUMAN RIGHTS under UK Law to lead a normal family life by HOME OFFICE UNLAWFULL REGULATIONS! Judged so by no less than EIGHT British Judges in FOUR UK Courts icluding the UK Supreme Court!
Those UK Judges have criticised the Home Secretary for introducing and implementing her UNLAWFULL Regulations without seeking Parliamentary consent by side- stepping Parliamentary scrutiny! Note these are just Home Office Regulations not UK Law!
So do you, who is I will assume a democrat, want an appointed politician to implement unlawfull regulations which affect me today but maybe you tomorrow?
I live in a area with respectable neighbours who are all dismayed at our treatment by Theresa May and her Home Office / UKBA policies and regulations.
One neighbour is a retired QC and Judge. When I discussed the UKBA with him his comment was ' the UKBA is an open door to corruption'! Recent events have justified his comment in full.
The problem is people like you just do not know the facts. You read the wrong newspapers which have more interest in circulation profits than informative knowledge for public consumption and unfortunately you actually believe what they print!
Theresa May has been targeting easy lawabiding migrants, like my wife, but has blatantly ignored the non law abiding migrants and people like you just do not understand the difference! Cameron May & Green have conned you all and allowed in criminals & terrorists!
In that process my rightto a family life as a born & bred British national has been trashed!
My fate today but maybe the thin end of the wedge the end of British democracy for all tomorrow!
There is no such thing as UK law and won't be while we remain in the corrupt EU, I base my opinions on real life experience if you knew me and my background you wouldn't be so judgemental, incidentally I was quite a tolerant chap until I read some quite distrubing comments posted by a New Zealand blogger resident in UK , ever since I read his disgusting anti British racist views I have realised just how much contempt many migrants have for this country and British people, an odious person who gives every decent migrant a bad name, he does more to gain the BNP support than the Daily Mail ever could. Even migrants have been horrified at some of his offensive comments.
Geronimo, you judge me without knowing me, I have suffered discrimination for being British in this country, I have even been threatened in the street by a gang of Eastern Europeans, racism cuts both ways but people like you play the race card/victim angle without even believeing that anti British racism/discrimination exists, it does and I speak from personal experience. Please don't patronise me.
David there is such a thing as UK Law and it is written into UK history from Magna Carta thro to the Suffragettes. The EU is nothing to do with UK Law that is a trading black.
If you are referring to the European Convention on Human Rights then that originated after WW2 from Sir David Maxwell-Fyffe a Nuremburg prosecutor and a French Resistance leader. It was supported by Winston Churchill and the UK signed as a signatory of which there are now 47 nation signatories. The UK was instrumental in its conception and encouraged other nations to sign the Convention. I suggest you read the Articles and ask yourself are they well intentioned or not?
As for a New Zealand blogger with anti British views in the UK well that hardly justifies labelling all other migrants with the same brush. The BNP as we all know are a racist organisation as were the Nazis. In fact it was reported BNP members were found in UKBA!
If you suffered form East European street gangs that is very bad but again does not justify branding all migrants with the same label.
East Europeans were invited into the European community as a response to the Soviet Union which perhaps was a mistake because that allows all EU passport members into the UK regardless.
However again that does not justify 'hatred' towards NON EU nationals many who are quite innocent respectable law abiding people who have a love of the UK like my wife.
My wife has a BA degree she worked for a multi national company she is a devout Buudhist loyal to her own King and Country and she loves the UK where she lived with me.
All our neighbours know her and her English teacher, our neighbour a retired school Head, and the retired Judge all know her. We have a joint bank account, her name was on the Council Tax bill, she shops they all know her in the shops. But the UKBA denied her a new visa!
Why because T May wanted to reduce Migrants numbers and increase Emmigrants to say she was tackling Immigration! But she wasn't!
What T May was doing was failing to tackle the terrorists the criminals the Torturers letting them into the UK but keeping out good innocent law abiding peopel who mean the UK no harm who cost the UK no funds.
T May didn't tackle your East European gangs or the NZ racist instead she chose the easy targets honest respectable self supporting people who were indeed harmless!
The so called popular press incited racism against all NON EU nationals irrespectively.
I am for keeping out the criminals the terrorists and torturers but innocent law abiding self supporting people just because the are NON EU is discriminatory racism in breach of the UK 1976 RACE RELATIONS ACT and the UK 1971 IMMIGRATION ACT! Look it up!
David I can only judge you by what you posted on this sight. I read you were against all migrants. I have attempted to advise you all migrants are not bad people! I hope you now understand.
I am British born and bred. I have lived and worked overseas. I have met good people and we cannot on our island be isolated from the world and allow ourselves to have island minds!
Does the B in 'UKBA' mean border? Take a walk around the average British town or city, see what I mean, this country is nothing but a dumping ground, borders, don't make me laugh.
We would have 'borders' if the Politicians, the Government, the Executive Ministers , the Home Office and the UKBA all of them did their jobs properly.
But the UKs politicians have been more interested in their jobs, their salaries and expenses instead of the UK as a country and the people of our the UK.
Other countries have enforcable borders but not the UK. Why? Its because the UKs politicians prefer to con the public they are doing a good job when they are not.
The UKs politicians have allowed themselves to be corrupted and influenced by the gutter press.
We have seen that in recent events of phone hacking and undue influence.
No one believes phone hacking is confined to just one organisation or police corruption.
But if the mass of the people took their eyes off press sensationalism and sex and sport which sell their newspapers and instead chased their MP for efficiency competence and accountability from their MPs, the Goverment and Govt Depts from the NHS to the UKBA let alone the MoD, Min Pensions to HMRC then the UK will not improve.
While British people continue to tolerate these current low standards and fail to hold their MPs to account then the situation will only continue to worsen.
The British people should read the informed press and compare then lobby their MPs for change or we sink further into this abyss and become just another 'has been' country!
I dont believe in borders! I am aprtof the no-borders campaign as I think we should be abletomove freely around the World, just wanted to make it clear that you are not speaking for me when you speak about the British people.
Ta Jacx
British laxity in enforcing our very liberal laws are being eroded and ignored by the sheer pressure of Undisirables ,as a result those who are and can be welcomed into Britain suffer ... There is no other country in the world that will grant entry into their lands with the level of tolerance and criticisms Britain is being asked to make.
Jacx you believe in a perfect world. I have travelled world wide and have yet to find a perfect country. In the meantime we have to live with the imperfect world we have. When you find your perfect world let me know please. All of us will join you there! good luck.
Anthony when you say our laws are liberal I don't know what yardstick you are using.
UK laws are enforcible but they are not being enforced by the UK Coalition Government.
In fact the UK Home Secretary has breached UK Law by introducing UNLAWFULL regulations without Parliaments scrutiny and consent. Not my words but the UK Judiciary
See Matrix Law Firm legal advise to Liberty UK of September 2010.
The Coalition Govt has introduced UNLAWFULL Regulations on the one hand and failed to protect the UK borders on the other! The Govts job is to enforced the law and it has failed!
When the UK Coalition Government is prepared to disregard and breach the laws of our own country yet introduces additional UNLAWFULL regulations which have not been put before and passed by the Parliament and which detrimentally affects UK citizens you have dictatorship and a state run by Politicians and not the representatives of the people.
Thats what we have in the UK today. Why doesn't the Home Secretary put her new regulations before Parliament? Is it because she knows that Parliament will not pass those regulations because they breach UK Laws? I think so!
We have this because the UK people are being misinformed by vested interests who would take the UK back to the 1930s Nazi Germany era and selectively exclude certain people and drastically reduce the freedoms of the rest. Vested interests are shaping UK public opinion by misinformation and by influencing Govt political action. i.e. News Intls recent influences.
If a Law needs ammending then do it thro democratic Parliamentary process not by introducing UNLAWFULL regulations!
But that isn't what is happening in the UK today.
UK Laws are liberal for some. Remember the Libyan Mousa Kousa the man in charge of Gaddafis prison where Libyans were tortured and massacred. He was allowed into the UK was able to collect his assets and then go to Qatar. He had committed crimes against humanity and should have been sent to the International Criminal Court. But the UK let him walk free with his money because he was friends with MI6 and helped them with extraordinary redition. It was on BBC Panorama where they tried to interview him in Qatar!
Yes the UK Law was very liberal for him but I know British nationals who are not so lucky!
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