2. Memorandum submitted by the Home
Office
When I gave evidence to the Committee on 19
November I agreed to write to provide further information on a
number of areas.
The Committee asked about the number of asylum
seekers who have been successfully prosecuted in recent years
for travelling on false documentation. As I said at the evidence
session, the statistics are not collected centrally for the number
of people successfully prosecuted for travelling on false documents,
nor how many of those are asylum seekers. The reason for this
is that prosecutions could be brought under different offences
(under the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981 and the Immigration
Act 1971), which also include other types of behaviour, so it
is not possible to distinguish between the reasons for the conviction.
Further, information is not collected for defendants based on
whether they have made a claim for asylum or not.
Although for these reasons, I cannot provide
definitive information on the number of convictions, I am confident
that the figure of 5,000 supplied by JUSTICE is a very significant
over-estimate of the true figure. At Gatwick, internal records
were kept of charges brought in the 1990s for travelling on false
documentation—there were 306 recorded. We do not have equivalent
records for other parts of IND but based on the Gatwick records
a very rough estimate would be a total of 1,000 charges for the
relevant offence. The actual number of convictions would
be lower than this figure of 1,000 and the number of convictions
of asylum seekers would be lower still. Also, as a further indication
of scale, since the Adimi judgment, fewer then 20 people
have successfully claimed compensation for wrongful conviction.
At the evidence session Bill Jeffrey said that
we are keen on looking at more covert ways of ensuring that we
can link people back to the flights they arrived on and that we
are having more success in linking people who present themselves
without documents with the flight we believe they originally came
in on. Indeed, in addition to the meeting of aircraft by immigration
officers specially trained in overt surveillance and document
examination, we have been using a dedicated CCTV system at Heathrow
Airport since August 2003 to support the work of these officers.
This has proved successful in increasing the linkage rate of inadmissible
passengers to their flight of arrival (averaging 84% at Heathrow
in November 2003). In recent weeks a number of immigration officers
at Heathrow have received training in the use of covert ("Directed")
surveillance for use in the Restricted Zones of airports and the
immediate environment. This new resource will be targeted at those
who facilitate the arrival of those with no documents or false
documents. The officers will work closely with the Heathrow Immigration
Prosecution Unit and other border agencies. These activities will
be fully compliant with the Regulation of Investigatory Powers
Act (RIPA).
The Committee also asked about the definition
of being qualified to provide advice in the immigration field
and related criteria. Section 84 of the Immigration and Asylum
Act 1999 prohibits the provision of immigration advice or immigration
services, in the course of a business, unless a person is qualified.
A person is qualified if they are authorised to practise by a
designated professional body (eg The Law Society) or are registered
with the Immigration Services Commissioner. Those authorised by,
or registered with, EEA equivalents are also qualified, as are
those employed or supervised by a qualified person. The Commissioner
may certify a person as exempt from the general prohibition and
such an exemption will apply to anyone employed or supervised
by that person. Anyone acting in breach of Section 84 is committing
a criminal offence under Section 91 of the 1999 Act.
An immigration adviser acting for profit who
is not authorised to practise by a designated professional body
must apply to register with the Commissioner. Those acting not
for profit (eg CABx, charities or voluntary groups) must apply
for exemption. When considering applications for registration
or exemption, the Commissioner will look at organisational standards,
levels of knowledge, competence and the character of those involved.
I would like to take this opportunity to clarify
my comments at the evidence session about the status of asylum
claims from nationals from the new Member States after accession.
Such claims will not automatically lapse on accession, but we
expect most asylum seekers to withdraw their claims once we make
them aware that they can remain in the UK by virtue of their EU
citizenship. This is what we did in previous accessions and the
vast majority of asylum seekers withdrew their claims.
I should like to clarify some information concerning
removals in my letter of10 November. On page two I advised that
provisional statistics indicated thatwe were now removing around
1,500 failed asylum seekers each month. This isnot the complete
picture and I should have added that the provisional statistics
show that we are also removing around 1,300 non-asylum seekers
each month who have no right to remain in the UK. In addition
the provisional statistics show that we are consistently making
over 3,000 port removals each month. This adds up to a total of
approximately 5,800 removals each month.
Beverley Hughes MP
Minister of State
3 December 2003
| 
