I’m sorry to harp on about this and will return to some substantive legal blogging next week (there’s been a fairly lengthy change to the rules that I haven’t even looked at yet, for starters).

I can’t help noticing that UKBA have rather changed their tune, and certainly their tone, with the latest press release on fining employers. See my previous post on this for the rather rabid language previously being slavered by them. Now compare to the latest one:

Chief Immigration Officer Jack Davis, said:

‘We continue to offer advice to employers with foreign nationals among their staff and genuine employers have nothing to be concerned about by contacting us for help.

‘However, those who persist in using illegal labour to cut costs will be penalised and we will concentrate our efforts on them to reduce the incentive for illegal migration to this region.’

A tough new civil penalty system was brought in last year to provide a fast and effective way of tackling bosses who fail to carry out proper checks on workers from outside Europe. A fine of up to £10,000 per worker can be imposed for every illegal worker found at a business.

Not quite so strident now! One of the enormous ironies that seems to have escaped Chris Grayling and others (‘BS should be treated exactly the same as any other employer’ etc) is that she is the first private individual to be fined in this way. UKBA have never previously pursued this course, and I imagine probably will not in future. Although that won’t prevent Middle England as a whole from asking some awkward questions of those beneath their stairs. It’s going to be a tough time for foreign looking cleaners, I imagine.