FOOTAGE shows inside a deportation flight for foreign criminals being flown out of the UK.
The rare video sees a group of serious offenders, including killers, thieves and sexual abusers, being taken back to Romania part way through their prison terms.
Rare footage has revealed what happens onboard a deportation flightITV News
The foreign criminals were sent back to RomaniaITV News
Some were seen being handed cards pre-loaded with £2,000ITV News
Some are even seen being handed bank cards pre-loaded with £2,000.
Up to half a dozen staff escort each offender up the stairs into the aircraft in the video, and some are put into restraints.
The footage, shot by ITV, shows the first time journalists have been allowed on such a flight for foreign national offenders (FNOs).
A total of 47 such criminals, including six women, were sent home, in an operation costing taxpayers hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The FNOs in the video originally came to the UK legally, but forfeited the right to remain when committing such serious crimes.
As part of the Facilitated Return Scheme, such deportees are given £2,000 to persuade them to volunteer to leave the country.
They are told to withdraw the cash once they arrive back in Romania and use it to get resettled.
The ITV coverage begins in a deportation centre near Heathrow, with journalists seen quizzing some of those being sent home.
One explains he’s been in the UK for 10 years and does not wish to go back.
Another refuses to say what crime he committed.
Multiple FNO flights take off from Britain every week, taking offenders to several countries – with 5,000 such people deported last year.
More than 10,000 eligible foreign inmates are currently serving time in the UK’s already crowded prisons, with the government prioritising their removal.
The flights take place in the dead of night – with every FNO to be escorted by at least three staff, and the most dangerous six.
The Home Office has refused to confirm which airline or airport is used.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, on seeing the footage, said giving such criminals £2,000 “doesn’t look good”.
However, she added: “A voluntary removal is actually cheaper for the British taxpayer.
Up to half a dozen workers escort each criminalITV News
A deportee waits to get onto the planeITV News
A worker checks names on a sheet on the flightITV News
47 men and six women were taken back to Romania on the flightITV News
“It has long been the case that we do offer financial packages as an incentive to people to drop their claims and drop the attempts they make to stay in our country, and to board a flight and leave.”
Since taking up her role, Ms Mahmood has vowed to “do whatever it takes to secure our border”.
She has said she intends to “ramp-up” one-in, one-out deportations to France – with just three having been sent home under the scheme so far.
When the UK-France returns deal was announced in July, it was suggested that 50 migrants a week would be sent back.
Flight flop as empty plane takes off
It comes after The Sun boarded a “one in, one out” deportation plane earlier this month – but it took off without a single boat migrant on board in another huge blow to PM Sir Keir Starmer.
The Air France flight from Heathrow to Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris left with no asylum seekers after more last-minute challenges again blocked the start of the deportation pact.
It is thought that charities and lawyers frustrated the Home Office’s plan to return failed asylum seekers detained last month under a pact with Emmanuel Macron.
Several pairs of seats were left empty on the flight when Air France staff told The Sun it had been fully reserved.
Some passengers moved into the vacated seats after take-off to give themselves more room.
The 45-minute flight took off without any asylum seekers on board and with no staff from either the Border Force or Mitie, the contractor agency which runs the Harmondsworth Removal Centre.
Starmer had hoped the pilot scheme would act as a deterrent to would-be migrants crossing the channel.
In a letter circulated to members, leftist group Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants said: “All those being deported were detained in the UK upon arrival under the cruel ‘1 in 1 out’ scheme put in place this August between the UK and French governments.
The SunThe second planned ‘one in, one out’ deportation flight has taken off without a single boat migrant on board[/caption]
The SunSun reporter Thomas Godfrey on the plane[/caption]
PAAsylum seekers being put on a return flight[/caption]
“They are being threatened with deportation.
“You can insist on speaking to senior people (e.g. chief pilot, flight supervisor, anyone with power to stop the flight) out of concern for welfare of the passenger(s) on the flight and not disclose it is regarding a deportation until necessary.
“Emphasise that deportation against a person’s will is violent, abusive and oppressive.”
Some 155 migrants were detained at the start of August with those asylum seekers now eligible to be deported to France.
They have been held at the Harmondsworth Removal Centre just ten minutes from Air France’s base in Terminal 4.
But in the same time, some 5,000 people have made the journey across the Channel.
For each asylum seeker sent back, one pre-vetted refugee with a genuine claim will enter the UK.
The scheme is supposed to act as a deterrent against migrants making risky dinghy journeys which claim dozens of lives a year.
Sources in the French government previously told The Sun they regarded the deal as “experimental” and reserved the right to “terminate it at any time.”
Some 31,000 boat migrants have been brought to Dover this year with many paying thousands of pounds to illegal gangs.
gary stoneIt is thought that charities and lawyers frustrated the Home Office’s plan to return failed asylum seekers detained last month[/caption]
AFPA file photo of migrants being picked up at sea after attempting to cross the English Channel from France[/caption]
It’s yet another blow for PM Keir StarmerCrown Copyright Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
