Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp has demanded food delivery companies to "put their house in order" after exposing swathes of illegal migrants using an app "loophole" to work.Conducting his own investigation of illegal workers in Britain, Philp uncovered illegal migrants being offered multiple courier account logins online for as little as £40 a week and as much as £100 a week.FULL STORY HERE.
00:00Welcome to the show. So you know this is going on, you went in pursuit of them yourself and it's just got to the point now where every high street and every town really is festooned with these bikes.
00:12We have no idea who these people are and the blatant proof in this latest investigation by the Sun newspaper, as you know, accounts being sublet out for 40 quid a week, no checks, within moments really of coming to our shores.
00:26You can be whisking curries and burgers around and getting paid cash in hand.
00:29Yeah, Martin, you're absolutely right. It's completely outrageous. I went to that asylum hotel you showed in the clip just then, went there a week or so ago, and there was a pen full of bikes, as the clip showed, absolutely stuffed full of bikes with panniers on the back for Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eats and the illegal immigrants within, in some cases, just hours of illegally entering our country.
00:49They're illegal immigrants coming in by small boat. They're working on platforms like Deliveroo and the people smugglers are telling these illegal immigrants in France, if they come to the UK, then they can work here easily.
01:02So it's a pull factor that is attracting illegal immigrants to come from France and Germany into the UK.
01:08Now, first of all, the Home Office run that hotel and dozens of other hotels like it.
01:13So the Home Office, Yvette Cooper, should be shutting that down.
01:16Why is she paying our money, taxpayers' money, to accommodate these illegal immigrants in hotels and letting them run illegal working right under the Home Office's nose?
01:25Now, you saw that security guard in that video. He was very keen to kick me out when I was asking questions as a member of parliament, but he wasn't lifting a single finger to sort out the fact the illegal immigrants were illegally working for Deliveroo.
01:37Now, Deliveroo themselves and Just Eats and Uber Eats are frankly allowing this to happen on their platforms.
01:43They claim they do checks, but that is absolute nonsense, as evidenced by the fact that all those illegal immigrants in the hotel are working.
01:49And then there's the evidence of the Sun journalist who managed to successfully get himself a Deliveroo login.
01:56So any checks they're doing, if they are doing any for that matter at all, are clearly not working.
02:01They are facilitating and encouraging illegal immigration.
02:05The Home Office should come down on those companies, Deliveroo, Just Eats and Uber Eats like a ton of bricks, prosecute them, fine them into next week.
02:12And frankly, if they can, personally prosecute the people running those companies as well, because they are creating a magnet, a pull factor for illegal immigrants to come to the UK.
02:21And then finally, there is a public safety aspect.
02:24I mean, often, for example, imagine a lone woman ordering a Deliveroo coming maybe to her house or flat late at night, thinking that the delivery driver is known to Deliveroo.
02:35But because of all this practice of renting out logins, either with or without Deliveroo's knowledge, the person who actually turns up to the door, you know, at midnight, could be, frankly, absolutely anyone, including an illegal immigrant who only turned up to the country a few days beforehand.
02:51So I think it's a safety risk as well.
02:52Now, Christopher, every time we do this story at Stupy News, no doubt we'll have a statement from the companies in a short while.
02:58They always say we're rigorous in our checks.
03:00We do everything in our power.
03:02But here we are again.
03:03It's Groundhog Day.
03:04I put it to you.
03:06On these WhatsApp message groups, it says once a day, if you ask for a facial ID recognition login, that's what the phone does.
03:13The app has that power.
03:14Simply message me, the account holder.
03:17I'll take a selfie of my mugshot, send it to you.
03:19Bosh, you're in.
03:21Clearly, the checks and balances don't work.
03:23Are we being fobbed off?
03:25Yeah, we're definitely being fobbed off.
03:26I mean, I wrote to the chief executive of some of these companies after my visit to the asylum hotel.
03:30I've got the usual response with all the usual platitudes.
03:34And when they say they're taking proper action to stop this, they're basically lying.
03:37They're not.
03:38I mean, the evidence is right there in front of us at the asylum hotel, on streets up and down the country, and the Sun journalists work as well.
03:45I think a couple of years ago, the Home Office did stop a load of Deliveroo riders to identify who they were.
03:51And it turns out I think over half of them had no right to work here.
03:55So, these companies need to urgently put their house in order.
03:59They are fobbing us off.
04:00They're lying, frankly.
04:01And it's about time the government took some action here.
04:04Now, Chris, of course, they would stringently deny that.
04:06They would say they're not lying.
04:09To be absolutely clear here, Chris, are you saying that the company owners should be dragged into court and prosecuted?
04:16Yeah, they should.
04:17Yes, they should.
04:18They're presiding over companies who are facilitating mass illegal working.
04:22It's not just, you know, a handful of drivers or, you know, 5%.
04:27It's huge numbers.
04:28It's thousands and thousands.
04:29And when you get people smugglers openly advertising in Europe, continental Europe, saying one of the reasons to come to the UK is you can easily work illegally on platforms like Deliveroo,
04:41they are providing people smugglers with their advertising material, fueling this flow, this flood of illegal immigrants across the channel.
04:49Isn't the first thing you've actually got to do, though, is put a stop, obviously, to illegal working?
04:55And so I presume your film has gone to the Home Office and all the details there so an enforcement team can go out there and deal with it.
05:02Yes, I wrote to Yvette Cooper with the full details, urging her to shut down the illegal working at that hotel and other hotels, which she directly controls,
05:09and secondly, asking her to get immigration enforcement to investigate.
05:13I also personally messaged the immigration minister with a screenshot of one of these websites where you can rent details to draw it directly to her attention.
05:22Right.
05:22And the other point there is obviously this is illegal working.
05:26There's no question about that, what you've discovered.
05:28But these people are not illegal migrants yet.
05:31They're asylum seekers, so they won't become illegal until their asylum claim has been rejected.
05:37Well, no, I disagree, because in my view, they're illegal immigrants the minute they cross the channel.
05:41That is in contra of...
05:42They may subsequently claim asylum, but they still entered the country illegally, contrary to Section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971.
05:49And because they came not directly from a place of danger, they came from France, which is safe,
05:54that means under the Refugee Convention they can be subject to penalties, including criminal sanctions.
05:59So they categorically, in my view, are illegal immigrants.
06:03OK.
06:03Well, we have a statement from Angela Eagle, of course, Dame Angela Eagle, who is the Minister for Border Security and Asylum.
06:10And she told GB News this.
06:12I welcome Villaburu Just Eats and Uber Eats pledge to increase facial verification checks following today's roundtable.
06:20We will keep a close eye on their progress and continue discussions.
06:23Now, under our plan for change, we are taking a zero-tolerance approach to illegal working across the board
06:30and arrests nationwide have increased by 51%.
06:33And we are strengthening legislation via our borders bill to end the abuse of flexible working arrangements.
