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Three pronged crackdown on illegal migrants to start from next month (28 August 2012)

Date: 28/08/2012
Duncan Lewis, Legal News Solicitors, Three pronged crackdown on illegal migrants to start from next month

As the government has launched a three pronged crackdown on illegal migrants the immigration minister Damien Green said that for years it had become almost impolite for politicians to raise concerns about record numbers of immigrants flowing into the UK.

He attributed the rise of extremist parties like BNP harvesting votes because politicians kept the issue of immigration under wraps.

He spoke out as it emerged a university had become the first in the UK to be stripped of its right to educate foreign students.

A UK Border Agency audit found that the London Metropolitan University failed on numerous requirements including allowing students to take lessons without valid visas and failing to report that some who had been granted visas, then failed to enrol on or attend courses.

Meanwhile, Home Secretary Theresa May launched a drive to stop abuse of the UK’s marriage laws which have allowed migrants to stay in the country illegally.

Ministers will change the rules so ceremonies can be delayed for investigations. Last year a vicar was jailed for staging 300 fake weddings, including couples who did not speak the same language.

Nearly 3.5million immigrants arrived in the UK during Labour’s 13 years in power between 1997 and 2010, with the tide increasing when ten former Soviet Bloc countries joined the European Union in 2004.

Critics say public services, including schools, hospitals and transport, had struggled to keep up with the influx, while some employers have been accused of using cheap, or illegal, foreign workers.

In a radio interview with LBC Radio, Mr Green said immigration had been like ‘turning on a tap’ under Labour. He compared immigration under Labour to ‘an oil tanker steaming hard in the wrong direction’ but insisted the Government was ‘getting to grips’ with the issue.

He spoke out as it emerged a controversial university had become the first in the country to be stripped of its right to educate foreign students.

London Metropolitan University’s licence will be revoked after the Home Office branded it a ‘threat to immigration control’.

He said that it was found that a lot of those who came to UK on a student visa, may have studied for a year or maybe didn’t study at all, but they then hung around after their visa was over and it’s clear that their main intention for coming here was to work. That kind of abuse enrages people.

He added the registrars would be empowered to refuse marrying people who cause any suspicion.

In the third prong of the crackdown, migrants who falsely claim benefits after coming to Britain to work, study or visit face being stripped of welfare payments, according to leaked documents. Nearly 20,000 people who arrived from outside Europe will be the first to be targeted in the new crackdown which will begin next month.

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