A UK Border Force official arrested in early December by anti-corruption officers may be an illegal immigrant himself, according to reports in the British media.
A Border Force officer has been arrested on suspicion of being an illegal immigrant, an already remarkable circumstance for a trusted government employee meant to keep the nation’s frontiers safe — yet in a further twist to the tale, it is claimed the same individual was also as part of an anti-corruption sting by specialist officers.
The claim, reported in The Sun newspaper, has it that a Border Force officer has been arrested on suspicion of immigration offences.
It is claimed the man, who is in his thirties, came to the United Kingdom 20 years ago from the Balkans and lied about his origin in order to secure his place in Britain.
The newspaper notes it was not unknown at the time for Albanian illegals to pose as Kosovans, most of whom are ethnically Albanian, to take advantage of that country’s war to pass themselves off as genuine refugees.
“On December 6, the Home Office Anti-Corruption Unit arrested four members of immigration staff on suspicion of misconduct in public office and conspiracy to steal,” the Home Office appeared to confirm in a statement quoted by LBC.
“One officer arrested as part of the conspiracy had previously been arrested and bailed on immigration offences,” they added.
Indeed, The Sun claims it “understands” the officer suspected of being an illegal immigrant was one of a group of people arrested in early December as part of another investigation.
“They were held on suspicion of misconduct in a public office and conspiracy to steal,” The Sun said, claiming that most of a group of four suspects were arrested at the Western Jet Foil immigration centre in Dover, Kent, where boat migrants are received and processed.
Western Jet Foil was described in a report in January 2022 as being “a large portacabin… with a capacity to hold 250 migrants”. It is from there that migrants are sent to Immigration Removal Centres or else given bail and sent on to hotels.
If proven true, the newspaper’s claims would amount to another scandal for the beleaguered Border Force, which has a workforce that doesn’t want to enforce borders and a leadership that doesn’t believe in them.
While ordinary Britons may look on with confusion or despair at the near-daily immigration crisis unfolding on the nation’s southern shores, some may yet come to ask whether the Border Force itself isn’t part of the problem.
Indeed, during recent strikes for better pay and conditions, Border Force officials have had to launch a counter-information push after claims emerged that the borders were actually better run in their absence.
A union boss has threatened to take the government to court over keeping border posts running during the strike, reports The Telegraph, complaining the soldiers doing Border Force’s jobs while 1,000 of its members were walking out were “untrained personnel” who didn’t have the legal authority to run the border.
The union leader said the supposed illusion of a well-operating border during the strike had been created by merely waving people through and not conducting proper border checks.
How this differs from how Britain’s borders are normally managed was not made clear.
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