John Page

Zero tolerance urged on foreign criminals
By Philip Johnston Home Affairs Editor
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.../ndeport02.xml

Serious criminal behaviour by foreign nationals should be met with zero tolerance, a report says today. It calls for a presumption that deportation will be recommended for any offence that brings a 12-month jail sentence.

One in eight prisoners - about 10,000 - is a foreign national and the increase in overseas inmates has taken up 3,500 more spaces in the past five years than had been expected.

Every year the courts recommend deportation in only about 600 cases but no statistics are kept to show whether these are actually carried out.

The study by the UK think-tank Migrationwatch suggests that the arrangements are haphazard and that the guidelines to the courts, unrevised for 25 years despite the big rise in foreign inmates, are unclear.

The Home Office says that any foreign national sent to prison, with the exception of certain Commonwealth and Irish nationals, is liable to deportation.

The Home Secretary can make such an order after a recommendation by a court or on his own initiative on the grounds that the offender's presence is not conducive to the public good. But no one knows how many are removed.

A few years ago the Government introduced a scheme under which foreign national prisoners serving sentences of more than three months were to leave jail up to four and a half months early, bringing them INTO phpbb_line with the home detention curfew for domestic prisoners.

Paul Goggins, the Home Office minister, said at the time: "There are many foreign nationals in prisons, some of whom will be suitable to deport before the end of their sentence.

On removal from prison they will be deported immediately to their country of origin. This will have a positive impact on the prison population as well as making a saving to the taxpayer."

The Home Office said that 1,500 prisoners had been removed under the scheme in the past year, although its parliamentary answers admit that deportation figures are not kept.

Migrationwatch says the system is unfair to those who are deported because proceedings usually begin only towards the end of the sentence.

As there are opportunities for appeal, the inmate can be kept in custody long after the term handed down while legal arguments continue.

The report calls for central records to be kept, including biometric information that should be available to posts that issue visas overseas to prevent offenders applying under a false identity.

The Sentencing Advisory Council is drawing up guidelines to the courts on how and when deportation should be recommended.

In a consultation paper last year it also criticised the lack of official figures. The last statistics it could find dated from 1996, when 360 court recommendations were made and 270 carried out.

Migrationwatch says: "At present, it is not possible to make deportation part of the sentence. The law should be changed to permit this to reduce the amount of time spent by foreign prisoners in Britain's heavily overcrowded jails."

"There should also be a presumption that deportation should be recommended for certain offences, including drugs, people smuggling, forgery of travel documents, serious offences of violence and sexual offences."

Logan

as a normal MOP I would estimate that Forigners are responsible for approximately 60% of serious crime in the UK, just look at the News every evening and I rest my case, Cheers Tony!

__________________
only dead fish go with the flow

www.abcounties.co.uk

proud to be \"indigenous\"

mkpdavies

Crime gangs are just taking advantage of an open doors policy, that provides little to no vetting of people coming here. That means the criminal minortity in poorer countries, now have a more luxurious pond to fish from.

This means ordinary, hard working immigrants are going to be tarred with the same brush and it can only end in tears.

This is so obvious, that you have to ask yourselves what the real intentions are?

__________________
http://brits4ronpaul.blogspot.com/
http://wokinglibertarians.blogspot.com/
http://lpuk.org

My ignore list

Labour, Blue Labour, Lib Dems

kernow

It is quite obvious that a rich Country like Britain with open borders, with it's poor record of apprehending criminals, who even if they are"unlucky" enough to be caught, know they face soft penalties because of Lilly livered liberal judges who are more concerned with the welfare of the perpetrators of crime than the victims. Our Country managed as it is, is bound to attract the "dregs" of society from the rest of the World or in our case Europe! You may laugh or be horrified :shock: at my "Little Piles of ash" but what ever they're using to deter criminals at the moment isn't working!

David Holland

[quote="John Page"

Every year the courts recommend deportation in only about 600 cases but no statistics are kept to show whether these are actually carried out.

."[/quote]
That is silly deportation should be automatic unless there are very good grounds or it is a very minor crime - not paying TV licence.