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A record 5,000 foreign lawbreakers removed from UK

26 December 2008

More foreign criminals than ever before have been kicked out of the country by the UK Border Agency in the past 12 months.

The UK Border Agency’s figures, announced today show it met the tough target set by the government for 2008, exceeding last year’s total of 4,200 foreign criminals removed.
 
Those removed by the Agency include 50 killers and attempted killers, over 200 sex offenders and more than 1,500 drug offenders. This underlines the government’s continued commitment to remove the most harmful people first.

New partnerships 

The UK Border Agency now has immigration teams working alongside the Prison Service in prisons to ensure that those that come here and break the rules are removed as quickly as possible. Approximately one in five foreign prisoners are removed directly from prison 180 days before their release date.

In order to maintain its high level of removals, the UK Border Agency committed earlier this year to put in place new crime partnerships with police across the UK. Eighty five per cent of these partnerships are already in place, with immigration officers and the police teaming up to target the ‘Mr Bigs’ and the facilitators of illegal immigration.  

Statement from the Border and Immigration Minister

Phil Woolas said, ‘Britain will not tolerate those that come here and break our rules, which is why we set the UK Border Agency the tough target of removing 5,000 foreign lawbreakers this year.
 
‘By exceeding this target we’re showing once again that there’s no place in Britain for those that continue to abuse our trust.
 
‘We now consider for deportation all non-EEA foreign nationals who go to prison for serious drug and gun offences no matter how long their sentence.’
 
Among the 5,000 foreign prisoners removed this year were: 

• a Portuguese man convicted and sentenced to five years in prison for possession with intent to supply cocaine, heroin and cannabis
• a Pakistani man convicted of sexual assault on underage girls and sentenced to three, nine month sentences to run concurrently
• a Kosovan man convicted of trafficking for sexual exploitation and sentenced to three and half years in prison
• an Indian man sentenced to five years for the attempted kidnap and sexual assault of an underage girl
• a Malawian man given a four year sentence for rape. 
  • detected over 3,000 forged documents
  • searched over 747,100 lorriesbarred more than 18,600 individuals from attempting to cross the channel illegally
  • seized in excess of 670 million cigarettes - representing a potential loss of £126.5 million in tax revenue
  • seized £228.6 million worth of illegal drugs
  • seized over 4,500 dangerous weapons, including firearms, stun guns and hundreds of knives.

Notes to Editors

The high level of foreign criminals removed is just one of the immigration milestones that the Home Office has met this year including: 

• the hi-tech electronic-Borders programme which now checks passengers before they travel to the UK against immigration, customs and police watch-lists. This has already led to more than 2,500 arrests, including murderers, drug dealers and sex offenders. e-Borders will screen 99 percent of foreign nationals in and out of the country by the end of 2010
• introducing new on-the-spot fines for employers who hire illegal workers and since then we have issued over 1,000 fines worth over £10 million
•  rolling out a new Australian-style points system for foreign workers so only those with skills the country needs can come and no more
• issuing the first identity cards to foreign nationals so those who are here legally can prove it and prevent those here illegally from the privileges of life in the UK.

In 2009 the UK Border Agency will continue to strengthen our borders through the Border, Citizenship and Immigration Bill. This will end automatic citizenship based on length of stay. Newcomers will have to earn the right to stay and demonstrate they can speak English and have knowledge of life in the UK before becoming a probationary citizen.
 
The statistics on removal / deportation of foreign national prisoners are based on provisional management information collected by the UK Border Agency. They may be subject to revision and are not part of National Statistics. 

National Statistics on total removals and voluntary departures in 2008 will be released on 24 February 2009.

 

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