Further written evidence to be reported to the House
UK Borders Bill
12:00 pm
Gordon McLardy: Currently, the section 8 defence is not complicated, but can be perceived as complicated. It is very time-consuming for employers to check through the relevant documentation. At NCP we do employ quite a lot of migrant workers, with quite high turnover in certain areas of the business, and we find a varied amount of either fraudulent documentation, which is absolutely spot-on and really good quality, or very poor quality documentation, where someone may have cut out the picture and stuck a different picture on. You do get a variety of documentation, which makes it difficult for employers.
We do a number of TUPE transfers for new employees. Of course, when you do that you are relying on the previous employers to have done the thorough checks, and in our experience that is not alwaysthe case—so much so, that in the illegal migrant community that we come across now and again, we sometimes find the sharing of identification, where some unfortunate individuals might find that with that identity comes previous convictions, which they were not aware of. We face a variety of issues. Some are easy to overcome; some are not, so much so that on occasion it can be easier—although we do not do that—not to employ someone from another country. It is much less easy to check on someone from outside the EEA. It can be quite fraught with a number of pitfalls.