Illegal delivery riders face removal following enforcement blitz

Delivery riders caught working illegally across Britain face being removed following a major operation by the Home Office's Immigration Enforcement teams.

During just seven days of action last month, 171 riders were arrested. Of those, 60 were detained for removal from the UK.

The operation saw Immigration Enforcement officers stop delivery riders operating in villages, towns and cities right across the country. Those found to be working illegally were arrested on the spot.

The results follow government revealing that in the last year, enforcement action to disrupt illegal working across all sectors reached record breaking levels, with over 11,000 visits and 8,000 arrests - a 51% and 63% rise respectively.

On top of this, nearly 50,000 people with no right to be here have been removed since July 2024 and people smuggling arrests, convictions and seizures have increased by 33% in the past 12 months.

Last week, Border Security Minister Alex Norris met with Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats to discuss work they are already carrying out to tackle illegal working on their platforms and how they can go further.

This includes the firms' continued work to ramp up randomised facial recognition checks to tackle illicit account sharing and receiving the location of asylum hotels to monitor for illegal working hotspots.

The activity forms part of Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood's sweeping reforms to tackle illegal migration in Britain. This includes increasing removals and deportations and making it less attractive for illegal migrants to come to the UK.

Border Security Minister Alex Norris said:

These results should send a clear message: if you are working illegally in this country, you will be arrested and removed.

As well as delivering record levels of enforcement, we are tightening the law to clamp down on illegal working in the delivery sector to root out this criminality from our communities.

This action is part of the most sweeping changes to illegal migration in modern times to reduce the incentives that draw illegal migrations here and scale up removals.

On Tuesday this week, the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill received Royal Assent. This will see the introduction of new laws to expand right to work checks to the gig economy, including on delivery riders.

The legislation will close existing loopholes so there will be no hiding place for illegal workers to flout the rules in gig, casual, subcontracted or temporary worker roles. Bosses who fail to conduct these checks could be jailed for up to 5 years, face fines of £60,000 per illegal worker and have their businesses closed.

During Operation Equalize, officers made arrests right across the UK.

On 15 November, officers attended The Jade Wok restaurant in Solihull. Two people of Chinese nationality were arrested for illegal working. Both were detained for removal from the UK.

On 17 November, officers deployed to the High Street in Newham. Four riders of Bangladeshi and Indian nationality were arrested for illegal working. All four were detained for removal.

And on 25 November, officers attended Norwich City Centre where they conducted a crime reduction operation. Three riders of Indian nationality were arrested with two detained for removal. The third individual was placed on strict immigration bail.

Criminals are using dodgy shops on high streets to hide serious crimes, from money laundering to illegal working. They are undercutting honest business owners and must be stopped.

That's why the government is relentlessly pursuing these criminals and their dirty money and has recovered £300 million in criminal assets in the past year. Communities are also being backed with new powers to block some unwanted shops and giving them a greater say over what's in their high streets.