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Attention this week has focused on the abject farce of what the government coyishly describes as “supervised accommodation”. What this really means is hotels booked entirely for migrants who have illegally crossed the Channel, and then immediately started working in Britain’s burgeoning black economy while the supervisors stand by wringing their hands.
Illegal immigrants who are placed in these hotels receive free housing, meals, dentist and GP appointments, entertainment, bus and train fares, and £50 a week in pocket money. Working illegally under the table can easily net them a few hundred quid a week more. With all their living expenses paid for, this money is purely disposable income.
Once you have paid for your home, bills, food, and other expenses, do YOU have £1,000+ a month left over? Do your children, parents, friends or colleagues?
Professor Stafford Beer famously said:
“The purpose of a system is what it does.”
It is hard to avoid concluding the purpose of our system is now to tax working Brits to the hilt, while providing massive subsidies to people who are here illegally, working illegally, and driving down the wages of those same Brits.
Of course, we can’t excuse the cowboy companies that profit from this system either.
Delivery companies like UberEats, Deliveroo and Just Eat legally describe their workers as contractors. This allows the “contractors” to find a substitute to do their work when the contractor is unavailable. In practice, this means people with the right to work in Britain simply apply to work for one of these delivery companies, then rent their account to someone who does not have the right to work in Britain.
This suits the delivery companies just fine – illegal workers are unlikely to complain about poor working conditions or pay below minimum wage.
Credit: Paul Edwards, the Sun
Despite the previous Conservative government asking the companies to reign in this flagrant abuse, nothing has been done to actually enforce employment and asylum law. Earlier this week, a reporter from the Express saw multiple delivery drivers leaving a three-star asylum hotel in central London. It’s clear the problem has now grown out of control. No one at any level feels any obligation to follow the rules.
Fundamentally, this problem will not be solved until we:
- Ban the likes of Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat from permitting their drivers to rent out their accounts.
- Impose punitive fines on the companies that turn a blind eye to this dangerous practice.
- Make clear that migrants found to be working illegally while awaiting a decision on their asylum application will not be granted asylum.
- Require the companies to control and monitor the issue of licences.
- Ensure applicants for these accounts are properly vetted to check they have the right to work, but also to make sure they do not pose a danger to those they deliver to — especially women and the elderly.
This subsidy for criminality cannot continue – the government must act!
This is a preview of Migration Watch’s free weekly newsletter. Please consider signing up to the newsletter directly, you can do so here and will receive an email copy of the newsletter every week as soon as it is released.