Local Immigration Teams to be Introduced Across the UK

Apologies for this not being directly related to FIT... but I can foresee FIT's remit being extended even further!

Abstract:

"New Local Immigration Teams are being introduced across the UK, alongside Local Crime Partnerships with police, as part of a major refocus of the work of the UK Border Agency (UKBA), Home Secretary Jacqui Smith announced today. Around 7,500 UKBA officers and staff up and down the UK will be reorganized into 70-80 Local Immigration Teams and given a clear mission to focus on local immigration crime...

Each local team will enforce the full range of immigration laws, concentrating on intelligence gathering, the disruption of illegal activity, tracking down and detaining immigration offenders and failed asylum seekers, and tackling illegal working. The new teams will work shoulder-to-shoulder with police, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, and local partner agencies, in a new series of partnerships announced today. Staff in Birmingham, Croydon, Glasgow, Liverpool and Sheffield will also fingerprint foreign nationals applying for their ID cards from November this year."

You can read the full article here