Home Office demands tough checks for truck stowaways
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by Karen Miles The Government wants to force international drivers coming into UK ports to check the roofs of their trailers for signs of entry by illegal immigrants—even though it admits the practice is dangerous.
A consultation paper issued without publicity at the end of last month confirms government plans to impose £2,000 fines on hauliers for each illegal immigrant discovered in their trailers unless they can prove they have followed a long list of time-consuming vehicle checks.
In the paper, the Home Office says drivers must make checks of trailer roofs, despite warnings by the Road Haulage Association that they present an illegal health and safety hazard.
Arty system of checks that excludes a vehicle's roof would be -incomplete and therefore ineffective", says the document, but it suggests the ''setting up of checkpoints in ports such as Calais. with facilities to enable examination of roofs".
The trailer roof and truck body must also be fully checked during loading; whenever the trailer is re-opened; when there is a change of drivers (particularly after stops when the vehicle has been left unattended); and immediately before the vehicle boards a ship or train to the UK.
Hauliers coming through the south Kent ports will be the first to operate under the new scheme. followed by a phased implementation for vehicles entering through other ports.
However, the Home Office concedes operators will find the code of practice requirements difficult to accept because they are time-consuming and costly.
Trailers which cannot be locked or sealed must be checked internally before boarding and the operator must be able to show it made arrangements to prevent illegal entry, if it wants to avoid a fine.
Operators with sealed vehicles will need to develop numbering systems which will prevent seals being opened and substituted without their knowledge. These numbers will have to be recorded by the company.
Hauliers will also need to record the checks made on the vehicle: this record might have to be produced immediately to an immigration officer on demand.
The Home Office denies that it has given hauliers too little time to consider the documents, arguing that the RHA and Freight Transport Association have been involved for many months.
III The number of clanuestine entrants detected at Dover has risen from 851 in 1997 to 8,878 In 1999, says the Home Office.
• See Comment, page 6.