:00:11. > :00:18.Tonight on Panorama: On the hunt for the ghost people. More than
:00:18. > :00:22.half a million migrants living beneath the radar in the UK.
:00:22. > :00:32.Some come here for protection but end up destitute on our streets.
:00:32. > :00:37.Even living in gave -- graveyards. Some come to work but get trapped
:00:37. > :00:44.in poverty and have no idea how to return home. This is no place for
:00:44. > :00:49.anybody to live. It absolutely stinks. Others have been in the
:00:49. > :00:54.hands of the authorities. But they were simply let go. You have
:00:54. > :00:59.stabbed somebody, been to prison here, it been in immigration
:00:59. > :01:04.detention centres. Can you tell me why the authorities allow you to be
:01:04. > :01:14.here? And we secretly film a criminal gang which smuggles our
:01:14. > :01:31.
:01:31. > :01:35.most desperate illegals out of the This is the first glimpse many
:01:35. > :01:39.people get of the United Kingdom. It has got one of the toughest
:01:39. > :01:42.borders in the world to cross. Many people are coming here because they
:01:42. > :01:46.need protection. They are fleeing war and persecution in their own
:01:46. > :01:56.country. But many more coming simply to live and work beneath the
:01:56. > :01:57.
:01:57. > :02:05.radar. On the French side of the Channel, migrants trying to board
:02:05. > :02:13.lorries heading for the UK. Just down the road, a British checkpoint,
:02:13. > :02:19.on French soil. They used probes to test for heart beats and to sniff
:02:19. > :02:27.the air for signs of life. There are heat detectors and sniffer dog,
:02:27. > :02:30.too. If there is anybody on here, the heart monitor should pick it up.
:02:30. > :02:37.They should do but it is luck of the draw as to whether you stop
:02:37. > :02:43.that lorry in the first place, really. This lorry is registering
:02:43. > :02:51.some movement. It is an anxious moment. They never know what to
:02:51. > :02:56.expect from a desperate migrants. We have got three in here. They say
:02:56. > :03:00.they are from Afghanistan, the country that produces more refugees
:03:00. > :03:05.than anywhere else. The police have got a feeling that these men have
:03:05. > :03:09.tried before. They are smiling and easy, chatting to each other. There
:03:09. > :03:14.are repeated attempts to get in. If they fail this time, they may just
:03:15. > :03:17.be released and have another go. Most of those they find are
:03:17. > :03:21.economic migrants. If they get through, they have got a foothold
:03:21. > :03:26.in the UK and might try to lose themselves in the system three
:03:26. > :03:34.years. But there are legitimate asylum seekers, too. I know. I have
:03:35. > :03:38.travelled with them. Four years ago I followed hundreds of migrants on
:03:38. > :03:43.one of the most dangerous migration routes in the world, from sub-
:03:44. > :03:52.Saharan Africa to Europe. They travel thousands of miles, largely
:03:52. > :03:55.on foot, cross the desert. As many as one in four di on the journey.
:03:55. > :04:03.From the North coast of Africa they board overcrowded boats to cross
:04:03. > :04:11.the Mediterranean. Only a small number are targeting the UK. And
:04:11. > :04:15.only a fraction of those received asylum. How many people come to the
:04:15. > :04:18.UK to claim asylum? Not half as many as people think, actually. As
:04:18. > :04:26.to the number of asylum seekers coming to the UK would fit just
:04:26. > :04:30.about in the Olympic Aquatics Centre. So about 25,000 people. It
:04:30. > :04:36.is roughly 40%. If you compare that to be global refugee situation,
:04:36. > :04:40.only 2% of the world's refugees are in Europe. This man tried for
:04:40. > :04:45.asylum in the UK after fleeing Afghanistan five years ago. But he
:04:45. > :04:49.was refused. Rather than return home, he went underground. Living
:04:50. > :04:54.rough in Nottingham, surviving of charity from people at his local
:04:54. > :04:59.mosque. He is among tens of thousands of failed asylum seekers
:04:59. > :05:03.who have gone missing. How did you get across the water to Great
:05:03. > :05:08.Britain? That is very difficult, to get through British security.
:05:08. > :05:13.I know. You just get yourself under the lorry. So you were hanging
:05:13. > :05:17.beneath the lorry? Not inside it but beneath it? You come to the
:05:17. > :05:27.checkpoint, and we just crossed. The checkpoint was looking for us
:05:27. > :05:30.in sight. I was underneath. They did not know I was there. Zarif
:05:30. > :05:37.says his father was murdered for political reasons in Afghanistan
:05:37. > :05:44.and that he was then jailed but escaped. He came to the UK and was
:05:44. > :05:48.refused asylum. In the end, he was given the standard 21 days to leave
:05:48. > :05:53.the country. Instead he went underground, cutting himself off
:05:53. > :06:00.from all state support, becoming homeless. I cannot see anywhere
:06:00. > :06:10.that you could have slept around here. Over there, they're there is
:06:10. > :06:12.
:06:12. > :06:22.a quiet place. -- there is a quiet place. In here? I used to sleepier.
:06:22. > :06:27.-- sleep here. How long? Three years. Can I look in? That is your
:06:27. > :06:32.water bottle? Yes. This is my life. If you would like to stay with us,
:06:32. > :06:40.you can. You are inviting me to stay for a while? I could not stay
:06:40. > :06:45.for one night. A quarter of all asylum rejections are overturned on
:06:45. > :06:50.appeal. That means the initial decision in those cases was wrong.
:06:50. > :06:55.Zarif is gathering more evidence to reapply for asylum. Refugee groups
:06:55. > :06:59.say that the system often forces strong case is underground. I think
:06:59. > :07:04.it tells you everything you need to know about the fear, the genuine
:07:04. > :07:08.fear people have of returning home. We see clients every day that are
:07:08. > :07:11.prepared to take a prostitution rather than return. Prepare to take
:07:11. > :07:16.up criminal activity rather than return. In some cases prefer to
:07:16. > :07:21.take their own lives rather than return home. Zarif says that
:07:21. > :07:28.nothing would have turned into crime. While he fights his case, he
:07:28. > :07:35.is being looked after by a charity. If he fails this time, he said he
:07:35. > :07:43.will either return to the ghost community, or commit suicide.
:07:43. > :07:50.really tired of life. I don't want to stay any more like this. I want
:07:50. > :07:58.a better, nice lifelike other normal people. But others still see
:07:58. > :08:02.the UK as a soft touch. This is Kakengi from the Democratic
:08:02. > :08:07.Republic of Congo. He knows that separating bogus claims from
:08:07. > :08:15.genuine ones is a test for any system. He lives in London, beneath
:08:15. > :08:21.the radar, emerging for food and clothing after Red Cross -- at the
:08:21. > :08:24.Red Cross shelter. It is nice. How often do you come? Normally every
:08:25. > :08:29.Tuesday. I tried to make a difference in my life. Kakengi says
:08:29. > :08:38.that he is a loyal back home and a special adviser to the former
:08:38. > :08:43.President, until 2001. -- a lawyer. It did not want to come to beg or
:08:43. > :08:50.to be homeless, but the immigration system put me in this situation,
:08:50. > :08:54.humiliated me. Honestly it is a disgraceful situation. He uses the
:08:54. > :08:58.centre for washing and keeping clean. He says that things went
:08:58. > :09:04.wrong for him when the President was assassinated and he was accused
:09:04. > :09:11.of involvement in the plot. He says he was jailed and escaped, and then
:09:11. > :09:20.claimed asylum in the UK. He was refused, and for nearly a decade
:09:20. > :09:25.has learned the craft of being a ghost. Now I am becoming very wise.
:09:25. > :09:35.When I enter one street, my eyes are very sharp now, they look very
:09:35. > :09:37.
:09:37. > :09:43.far left and right, to see a police It turned out Kakengi was not being
:09:43. > :09:47.straight with us. The authorities describe him as an asylum shopper.
:09:47. > :09:53.They say that he arrived from Madrid a decade ago, on a Dutch
:09:53. > :09:57.passport belonging to someone else. Then he claimed asylum, failed. He
:09:57. > :10:01.turned up in Ireland, claimed there, failed. Returned to Britain, and
:10:01. > :10:07.took his place to judicial review twice. It cost the taxpayer
:10:07. > :10:11.thousands. In the end he was deported back to Ireland. Case
:10:11. > :10:15.closed. The UK Border Agency had no idea that he had managed to break
:10:15. > :10:19.back into Britain. We caught up with him again in London. You have
:10:19. > :10:27.not been straight with us, have you? You have not been entirely
:10:27. > :10:31.honest with us about your background. How come? You had two
:10:31. > :10:35.judicial reviews, didn't you? The judge said one was an abuse of
:10:35. > :10:39.process and the other was totally without merit. That cost the
:10:39. > :10:44.taxpayer money. What did you do after that? You are sent back to
:10:45. > :10:51.Ireland and then he vanished again. Actually nobody knew you were here.
:10:51. > :10:57.The Home Office knew. They had no idea. They know because my case is
:10:57. > :11:00.still on-going. How come I have a solicitor? I don't know, but the
:11:00. > :11:04.Home Office does not know that you are here. This is what they will
:11:04. > :11:07.say. If you try and pull the wool over my eyes, it is not fair
:11:07. > :11:12.because you are clogging up the system for people that are
:11:12. > :11:17.legitimate asylum seekers, trying to play it by the book. We went to
:11:17. > :11:20.his solicitors. They failed to respond. We have got an asylum
:11:20. > :11:24.shopper on the programme. When we found him and checked in with the
:11:24. > :11:28.Home Office, you have no idea that he was even here. What does that
:11:28. > :11:34.tell us? It tells you that it is possible. We do not catch every
:11:34. > :11:37.single person that tried to enter the country clandestinely. We are
:11:37. > :11:41.working with our European colleagues. We make sure people are
:11:41. > :11:44.fingerprinted, we check to see if they have entered the European
:11:44. > :11:49.Union in another country. If they have, we can return them to the
:11:49. > :11:55.country where they first entered. But part of the problem is with the
:11:55. > :11:58.UK Border Agency itself and its backlog of 300,000 cases. Not only
:11:58. > :12:04.that, the Chief Inspector of borders and immigration has been
:12:04. > :12:07.examining cases going back more than a decade. A report was
:12:07. > :12:10.published two months ago. They found cases that were considered to
:12:10. > :12:16.be closed simply because the applicants could not be traced.
:12:16. > :12:21.They found a backlog of more than 100,000 pieces of unopened mail.
:12:21. > :12:27.Because of all that, they found there were people who had acquired
:12:28. > :12:31.rights to stay in the UK who should have faced removal. But the
:12:31. > :12:37.majority of ghosts are not failed asylum seekers. They are people who
:12:37. > :12:42.came to the UK to work illegally. Many arrive on visas, as students
:12:42. > :12:51.or tourists, but do not leave, becoming overstayers who find work
:12:51. > :13:01.in the grey economy. Mr Ahmed was issued with a student visa. It was
:13:01. > :13:06.20th April, 2010, and it was fired in till March, 2011. -- and valid
:13:06. > :13:10.until. He is an overstayer. The UK Border Agency is playing catch-up
:13:10. > :13:17.and it is playing blind. There are no exit checks in the UK so it is
:13:17. > :13:23.difficult to know who has left the country and who has stayed behind.
:13:23. > :13:28.Today's target is a drinks warehouse. Many of the workers are
:13:28. > :13:38.Indian and Pakistani nationals. If they are overstayers, at least
:13:38. > :13:39.
:13:39. > :13:42.there is a record of them, fingerprints and photo ID to check.
:13:42. > :13:47.As soon as he gives his fingerprint, you should know whether he is an
:13:47. > :13:52.overstayer and who he is? Yes, we have enough information on him to
:13:52. > :13:59.find out. Some foreign students are allowed to work for limited hours.
:13:59. > :14:04.But for some, enrollment in a college is just a ruse. In 2009, of
:14:04. > :14:10.all the non-EU students who came to the UK, it is estimated around one
:14:10. > :14:17.in six work here illegally instead. You say you are sick but to turn up
:14:17. > :14:22.for work and you do not go to college. What is the name of your
:14:22. > :14:26.college? Student fees abuse has become so serious that the
:14:26. > :14:32.Government has recently banned more than 500 colleges from taking non-
:14:32. > :14:39.EU students. And they are rolling out a programme to interview high
:14:39. > :14:43.risk candidates face to face, to root out fees abuse. -- Visa abuse.
:14:43. > :14:49.Some of these men are not pretending to be students. They are
:14:49. > :14:52.Some of these men are not pretending to be students, they're
:14:52. > :14:55.just overstayers. You were refused leave to enter, OK. You were given
:14:55. > :14:58.temporary admission into the UK and you were due to leave several
:14:58. > :15:01.months ago and you're still here. So in light of that fact, you are
:15:01. > :15:04.now under arrest. Today, they arrest seven. But other overstayers
:15:04. > :15:12.sink into a criminal underclass and begin exploiting each other in the
:15:12. > :15:18.In East London, this woman, out on a shopping trip, is an Indian
:15:18. > :15:22.national who's become a madam, running a prostitution racket. Her
:15:22. > :15:26.name's Amarjit Kaur - known as Phabi. Her girls are largely
:15:26. > :15:36.overstayers. We're sending in our undercover researcher, Ruby, to ask
:15:36. > :15:40.
:15:40. > :15:45.The madam is suspicious - Ruby is a British national, not from the
:15:45. > :15:55.ghost community. But her fake back story stands up. Eventually the
:15:55. > :16:02.
:16:02. > :16:07.madam agrees to meet in Ilford and We'd already spoken to other girls
:16:07. > :16:14.who have worked for Mrs Kaur. Ushma is from north India - she came to
:16:14. > :16:18.work as a waitress. And how did you get here? I came here on a student
:16:18. > :16:24.visa that I got from an agent. did you have any intention, really,
:16:24. > :16:27.of coming here to study? No, I only came here to work and earn money.
:16:27. > :16:35.She ended up being exploited by her own community - something she's
:16:35. > :16:38.ashamed of. How many clients do you see each week? Sometimes it's two
:16:38. > :16:48.or three per day, sometimes five or six per day, sometimes only one per
:16:48. > :16:53.
:16:53. > :16:57.day, sometimes none. But in a week Ushma never wanted to be a
:16:57. > :17:03.prostitute. She says the economic downturn left her no choice and she
:17:03. > :17:09.sends most of her earnings home. Do your parents know what you do?
:17:09. > :17:17.they think I trained on a course. They think I work at a beauty
:17:17. > :17:27.In Ilford, Mrs Kaur, the madam, is talking business with our
:17:27. > :17:45.
:17:45. > :17:52.It was time to confront her. Mrs Kaur, hello, Paul Kenyon from BBC
:17:52. > :18:02.Television. You exploit young vulnerable illegals in this country.
:18:02. > :18:05.
:18:05. > :18:15.You exploit them to be prostitutes, But this young woman here - you
:18:15. > :18:22.
:18:22. > :18:29.were just offering her work as a Mrs Kaur has been in the business
:18:29. > :18:32.for four years, hidden within the Ushma is about to move on, but the
:18:32. > :18:38.only people she knows here are, themselves, illegals - what they
:18:38. > :18:43.call "fugis". What proportion of your clients are here illegally
:18:44. > :18:53.themselves? The majority of my clients are illegals, the majority
:18:54. > :18:56.
:18:56. > :18:59.are fugis. There's too many of them And we'd found some who've been
:19:00. > :19:07.involved in more serious criminality. And who the
:19:07. > :19:10.authorities know about, but have, So this is Ilford, east of London,
:19:10. > :19:20.and just over here in these derelict garages, which are full of
:19:20. > :19:27.
:19:27. > :19:30.really nasty rubbish, is where some This is Kuldeep. He hid in a lorry
:19:30. > :19:37.to get here a decade ago, and worked, illegally, on building
:19:37. > :19:45.sites, but his economic dream also turned sour. Like many, he fell
:19:45. > :19:51.into drink and drugs, risking his I want to go home because I haven't
:19:51. > :19:54.managed to get myself settled here. I've been away a long time and now
:19:54. > :20:01.there is absolutely no work. It's painful and it's better to go home
:20:01. > :20:07.now, it's better there. It's pointless destroying my life here.
:20:07. > :20:09.Remarkably, Kuldeep has been in the hands of the authorities many times.
:20:09. > :20:17.He's emblematic of the lack of joined-up thinking between police,
:20:17. > :20:23.immigration and prisons. I've been to prison three times and each time
:20:23. > :20:26.after serving my sentence, the immigration people took me. You've
:20:26. > :20:30.stabbed somebody, you've been to prison here, you've been in
:20:30. > :20:35.immigration detention centres. Can you tell me why the authorities
:20:35. > :20:42.still allow you to be here? That's what I don't understand - why the
:20:42. > :20:45.The Home Office says this is unacceptable and that a London-
:20:45. > :20:52.based scheme is about to be rolled out nationally to help police and
:20:52. > :20:56.immigration work more effectively on removals. We met quite a few
:20:56. > :20:59.people here who say they want to return to India. It's impossible to
:21:00. > :21:02.know how much effort they've really put into that, but what I do know
:21:03. > :21:12.is that they have come into contact with the authorities, and the
:21:12. > :21:22.The number of migrants living beneath the radar in the UK is
:21:22. > :21:25.estimated at more than 600,000. But others with money, who arrived on a
:21:25. > :21:31.criminal network, can now leave on one, too. Panorama's discovered a
:21:31. > :21:34.hidden travel service, smuggling illegals OUT of the UK. You might
:21:34. > :21:39.be wondering why they don't just hand themselves in to the
:21:39. > :21:42.authorities and ask to be sent home. Well, they've spent so much time
:21:42. > :21:49.and money getting to Europe, they might not want to go all the way
:21:49. > :21:51.back, but have a crack at Spain or Italy to look for work. Then
:21:51. > :22:01.there's another sort - people who've committed crimes and are
:22:01. > :22:03.
:22:03. > :22:10.We contacted a smuggling gang which claimed to be running up to three
:22:10. > :22:15.trips a week out of the UK. We arranged to meet. The person we
:22:15. > :22:24.want them to smuggle out is me. We've got a meeting coming up and
:22:24. > :22:28.this is the difficult bit where I morph onto an Eastern European. --
:22:28. > :22:31.into an East European. My story is I'm Chris from Molodva, which is
:22:31. > :22:34.outside the EU. I'm working here illegally with no passport or
:22:34. > :22:40.papers and I need to escape the UK. I'm waiting with a colleague who's
:22:40. > :22:49.got an in with the gang. Then one of them arrives on foot. He says
:22:49. > :22:59.he's called Munga and used to be a He tells us I'll be smuggled out
:22:59. > :23:14.
:23:14. > :23:24.They smuggle them on cross channel ferries - there are fewer checks on
:23:24. > :23:33.
:23:34. > :23:43.Just 1,500 pounds. OK. He needs to call someone higher up the chain to
:23:44. > :24:00.
:24:00. > :24:04.So that's it, seven o'clock tomorrow and the good news is that
:24:04. > :24:11.Munga, the person we have just met, is going to come with us in the car.
:24:11. > :24:16.So we're at the lorry seven o'clock It's crunch time - today I'm due to
:24:16. > :24:21.be smuggled out of the country. We set off in a car to meet the
:24:21. > :24:28.people-smuggling lorry. My team are keeping a close watch from a chase
:24:28. > :24:38.vehicle behind. My fellow passenger says he came here to work illegally.
:24:38. > :24:47.
:24:47. > :24:49.But now, it seems, soft-touch One of the things we do with our
:24:49. > :24:52.colleagues in other, both EU countries and non-EU countries, is
:24:52. > :24:54.work closely internationally to try to crack down on these gangs who
:24:54. > :25:04.are committing organised immigration crime and preying on
:25:04. > :25:29.
:25:29. > :25:34.We drive for two hours through the Finally we are directed to a
:25:35. > :25:44.housing estate, but the lorry's not there. They want to transfer me to
:25:45. > :26:23.
:26:23. > :26:31.Hi there, what is your name? Thank The ringleader tells us to waitand
:26:31. > :26:35.We're not prepared to hand over any money. Our chase vehicle caught up
:26:35. > :26:41.with us. It's time to make our move. Munga, from BBC Televsion, you help
:26:41. > :26:47.smuggle people out of the country, don't you, out of the UK? You are
:26:47. > :26:50.part of a gang that smuggles people out. No, no. Isn't that right? A
:26:50. > :26:55.lot of money smuggling people out of the country. No. Many, many
:26:55. > :27:01.amounts of money. No money. take it too, and the other man.
:27:01. > :27:04.Organise to get people across and leave the country.
:27:04. > :27:14.Our investigation found three other gangs offering illegals a secret
:27:14. > :27:18.A few days after we filmed at the garages, the authorities moved in
:27:18. > :27:24.to clear them and move the illegals on. But perhaps still not enough
:27:24. > :27:29.joined-up thinking between immigration and police. What is
:27:29. > :27:38.your status to be in the country? He's illegal, he's illegal, he's
:27:38. > :27:44.got status. But you are happy to remain in England or do you want to
:27:44. > :27:49.be moved? They all want to go back. Kuldeep, the man who'd been in
:27:49. > :27:54.prison, disappeared again. The authorities are now helping the
:27:54. > :28:00.others with their repatriation to India. Zarif has been picked up by
:28:00. > :28:07.immigration and is awaiting removal from UK. The immigration raid ended
:28:07. > :28:14.with three student overstayers being removed back to India. -- two
:28:14. > :28:16.Two more were detained pending removal. But in the end, those
:28:16. > :28:26.living destitute in the UK's ghost community may well decide they've
:28:26. > :28:27.