Stowaway plan to be reviewed
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by Guy Sheppard • High-tech equipment may soon be used to flush out illegal immigrants hiding in lorries, after the Government agreed to reconsider imposing automatic fines on hauliers caught carrying them.
The Road Haulage Association's Steven Norris and the Freight Transport Association's David Green won the concession last week at a meeting with immigration minister Mike O'Brien. They are to draw up plans about how best to detect stowaways on board lorries before meeting the minister again later this month.
Home Secretary Jack Straw has proposed a £2,000 fine for each illegal immigrant found hiding in trucks. O'Brien said after the meeting that the Government still wanted to ensure drivers checked their loads for stowaways. "It is difficult to see how that can be done without legislation or fines."
But RHA directorgeneral Steven Norris said: "I think the Government recognises that treating every haulier as a criminal was actually counter productive. We say the big flow of illegal immigrants has to be stopped at source, which requires the co-operation of industry, which we freely offer."
Equipment capable of detecting stowaways will now be examined, including body heat and carbon dioxide detectors as well as Xrays. Norris said these could be used while truck drivers organised ticketing for crossing to the UK.
He added that ports, ferry companies and the British Government must play their parts as well. "At Zeebrugge they take much more care in checking seats and inspecting loads; in Calais that is not happening." He said inspections needed to be conducted in the presence of an independent government official with the authority to break and re-seal consignments.
• Swindon-based EddaIls International Transport is the latest haulier to get caught up in the issue, after nearly HOD-worth of wine was drunk or smashed when a family of Albanian stowaways hid in one of its lorries. The wine was loaded in Dover after the driver had picked up a consignment of clothes in Belgium. The stowaways were discovered at a depot in Uxbridge, and claimed to polite that they had paid E30,000 to get to the UK.
Transport manager Bob Eddolls said: We think they had been shut in the lorry overnight. They were thirsty and they drank some bottles of wine. I think some bottles were smashed because a pallet fell nor."