LONDON (Labour Buzz) - As if they don’t have enough dodgy second jobs, a report in Politics.co.uk suggests MPs have been moonlighting as border guards with growing numbers of them tipping off the Home Office about illegal immigrants.
According to a freedom of information request, the number of reports rose from 70 in 2017 to 101 in 2018. Politics.co. The UK had previously revealed that MPs were using an immigration tip-off line and webpage to shop people for immigration enforcement.
This has led to a number of written parliamentary questions from MPs including David Lammy. Since then, 135 MPs have signed a pledge not to report their constituents in this way, although so far only Nigel Evans from among the Tories has signed up.
“I'm sad to hear that the number of incidences of MPs reporting their constituents to the Home Office has increased,” he told Politics.co.uk. “This is something I simply would never do. People need to have absolute knowledge that when they come to an MP for help they will be safe to talk without fear of retribution.”
He added that while illegal immigration is a serious problem “many people classed as illegal immigrants may be vulnerable individuals who have previously been trafficked, or indeed simply people who have simply accidentally overstayed their visa.”
Labour MP Peter Kaur Gill added that an MP’s duty “first and foremost to represent and assist constituents regardless of immigration status”.
The idea that MPs were reporting people who come to them for help adds to an already hostile environment and raises more questions about the approach of the Home Office. A series of unpredictable, and outright callous, decisions prompted John Elledge to ask in the New Statesman if the department could ever be deradicalized.
The same, it seems, is true of a growing number of MPs who have put their hostility to foreigners above their duties as an MP those who come to them for help.
(Written by Tom Cropper, Edited by Klaudia Fior)