Border and Immigration Agency mass raids to round up alleged illegal immigrants were yesterday condemned as a publicity-seeking ‘cynical approach by government’ by GMB national officer Sharon Holder.
News Line asked her to comment on a recent raid in Derbyshire, where a force of 60 Border and Immigration Agency officers, backed by police, stormed into a chicken processing factory, lined the workforce up against a wall and took away 22 workers in handcuffs, two of whom were deported.
BBC cameramen accompanied the officers throughout the operation.
Holder said: ‘Employers are supposed to check the status of workers.
‘These raids are obviously designed to generate good publicity for the government which has been under constant attack over immigration policy.
‘The UK is a country that migrant workers want to be in.
‘The trade unions welcome legal migrant workers.
‘Employers want to profit out of vulnerable workers with no rights.
‘But these kind of oppressive raids are a cynical approach aimed at gaining publicity for the government.’
Unite (TGWU) trade union deputy general secretary Jack Dromey also condemned the Derbyshire raid.
He said: ‘If it’s intended to cause fear, it will have the desired effect.
‘It will be fear among vulnerable workers forcing them deeper into the shadows where they will face deeper exploitation.
‘It will also cause fear amongst the public who will be panicked into thinking desperate measures are needed.
‘If the government is wondering why the public is losing faith in managed migration, what it needs to do is catch the rogue employers.
‘A one-off regularisation of all undocumented workers, which would allow workers to come forward, would show you exactly where the bad employers are.’
A UNISON spokesperson added: ‘These tactics would be very frightening for the people involved.
‘The immigration authorities need to think before they launch these kind of raids which are completely over the top.’
