Illegal workers may face up to six months in prison: new Immigration Bill in England and Wales

The persons who work without a legal permit to work in England and Wales are to be brought within further statutory measures. The proposed Immigration Bill, once enacted, would impose an unlimited fine, seizure of wages and more significantly, up to six months in prison if a person is found working illegally. The Bill also proposed measures to be taken against takeaway restaurants that are commonly accused of employing illegal migrants. James Brokenshire, the Immigration Minister, expressed his confidence in the measures that these would assist the government to prevent abuse of the system.

The Bill strictly deals with the takeaway and off-licences restaurants as they may lose their licences if they employ workers without permits. This measure may also be extended to cab drivers and operators. Furthermore, business organisations can no longer seek defence claiming that they had no knowledge about the employee’s status of his/her work permit. Business employers are obliged to carry out proper checks before employing migrants and in their defence they can now only show that they carried out proper checks about their employees. The effectiveness of such defence to the employers is limited as it is unlikely that employee’s work permit status could not be revealed with proper checks. Employers may face up to five years in prison with the fines already in force, if they employ illegal workers and fail to do proper checks on them. There are reports which suggest that Immigration Department is preparing for continuous raids targeting building sites, care homes and cleaning contractors in this autumn.