Dear UK Border Agency,

I refer to the article at http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/nov/05...

Please assist me with my enquiries into this matter by answering the following questions

1) The article quotes that this harassment is "regularly held at various public transport hubs". As well as bus stations please list every other type of "public transport hub" at which this harassment has been unertaken. The article quotes "Liverpool Lime Street, Liverpool Central and Crewe" two of which are undoubtedly railway stations.

2) Please list every "public transport hub" at which this harassment has been undertaken.

3) The article states that "someone who cannot satisfactorily prove their identity and nationality are removed from the bus "so as not to unduly hold other passengers up."" Under precisely what laws are your harassers permitted to ask people to "prove" their "identity", block them from leaving and remove them from a public transport vehicle? Note the word precisely. Generalised waffle such as "the immigration act 1971" is not an answer to this question.

4) Does this harassment extend to private transport? Are people walking, riding bikes and in cars harassed in the same way?

The current government stated that it wanted to move away from the "Ihre Papiere, bitte" approach the previous government was rapidly introducing to a formerly free country. Government bods demanding papers from passengers on buses in the UK is no different to when these were called controls and done by people with swastikas on their arms. That is not something I will tolerate.

Please note that "replies" which involve attachments in proprietary file formats are not acceptable. A reply which is not in plain text format will be deemed to be a refusal to answer.

Yours faithfully,

David Hansen

Dear UK Border Agency,

Two other questions which should be answered nwith the others.

5) Please provide a full list of documents with which people may "prove their identity and nationality". How many are needed?

6) Is any information demanded by your bods retained? If so how is it retained and how is it protected? Please provide a copy of the retention, protection and disposal policy.

Yours faithfully,

David Hansen

Dear Professional Standards for Enforcement,

You are yet more officials too arrogant to reply to your employers, one of who is me, in the plain text format they have requested. Not only that, you are so arrogant that you expect your employer to turn your reply into that format. With people like you it is no wonder this area is a mess.

For completeness below is your reply in the format you should have provided it in.

David Hansen
[email address]
Our Ref: FOI 20568
07 December 2011

Dear Mr Hansen

Thank you for your email of 6 November, where you have requested information on the UK
Border Agency‟s immigration operations at bus stations. This request falls to be dealt with
under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

You specifically asked us to provide;
1) A list of the types of public transport hubs, including bus stations, at which these
operations have taken place,
2) A list of locations at which these operations took place,
3) The specific laws that allow Immigration Officers to stop and question a person alighting
from a public transport vehicle,
4) Whether these laws extend to private transport vehicles; and whether people walking,
riding bikes and travelling in cars are treated in the same way.

These types of operations fall into two categories; Crime reduction operations (CROPs) which
are intelligence led operations organised by the police and undertaken in public areas or crime
„hotspots‟ with support from UK Border Agency, and Street operations (StOps) which are
immigration led operations.

I can confirm that during the financial year 2010/2011 the UK Border Agency undertook both
CROPs and StOps at train, bus, tube and coach public transport hubs, at the following
locations; Clacton train station, Dewbury bus station, Harrow & Wealdstone tube station,
Lewisham train station, Liverpool coach station, Liverpool Lime Street train station, Manchester
central coach station, & Shude Hill bus station.

The information above is sourced from the National Operations Database (NOD) system. The
NOD is a management information tool and data from is not and are not subject to the detailed
checks that apply for National Statistics. Figures provided from the NOD do not constitute part
of National Statistics and should be treated as provisional and may be subject to change.

The specific powers that Immigration Officers use to stop and question a person „in-country‟,
comes from paragraph 2(1) of Schedule 2 to the Immigration Act 1971 (as amended) and the
interpretation of this by the Court of Appeal in the case of Singh v Hammond in 1987. The
Court of Appeal in Singh v Hammond held that:
“An examination [under paragraph 2 of Schedule 2 to the ’71 Act] ... can properly be
conducted by an immigration officer away from the place of entry and on a later date
after the person has already entered ... if the immigration officer has some information
in his possession which causes him to enquire whether the person being examined is a
British citizen and, if not, ... whether he should be given leave and on what conditions.”
Using these powers Immigration Officers may legitimately question individuals encountered in
public places in order to determine their immigration status under three specific circumstances:



The intelligence is so specific that the Immigration Officer knows the immigration offender
will be travelling on a specific date, time, location, train etc;
The Immigration Officer has formed a reasonable suspicion that the individual is an
immigration offender e.g. from what is said by the person during the course of a prior
interview with a police officer; or
Where the individual displays an „adverse reaction‟ to a clearly identifiable immigration
presence. This could give rise to a „reasonable suspicion‟ that the person is an immigration
offender. An „adverse reaction‟ could include attempting to avoid passing through or near a
group of Immigration Officers, a sudden or unexplained change of direction, avoiding eye
contact or hanging back from barriers.

The powers extend to all public areas where it is safe and lawful for the immigration officer to
conduct enquiries under the three specific circumstances given above, and as such, they do
not favour any particular mode of transport or specific locations such as public bus stations.
Immigration Officers would not normally extend these powers to stop private vehicles in order
to question individuals.

Guidance given on powers, policy and practice on undertaking immigration operations in public
places, other than airports and seaports, is available in chapter 31(paragraph 31.19) of the
Enforcement Instructions and Guidance at:
http://www.bia.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecon...
ne/
If you are dissatisfied with this response you may request an independent internal review of
the UK Border Agency sending a substantive reply to your original request and should be
addressed to:
Information Access Team
Home Office
Ground Floor, Seacole Building
2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF
e-mail: [email address]
During the independent review the department‟s handling of your information request will be
reassessed by staff who were not involved in providing you with this response. If you remain
dissatisfied after this internal review, you will have a right of complaint to the Information
Commissioner as established by section 50 of the Freedom of Information Act.
Yours sincerely
C Pick
Professional Standards for Enforcement

Yours sincerely,

David Hansen

Dear UK Border Agency,

I request an internal review of your failure to answer questions 5) and 6) of my enquiry. These questions are at http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ha...

Yours faithfully,

David Hansen

Dear UK Border Agency,

I request a separate internal review into the veracity of the partial answer to my enquiry you have provided.

In the Observer article it states that Norton Street, Liverpool Lime Street, Liverpool Central and Crewe are locations where this harassment has taken place.

Your reply at http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ha... gives a, supposedly complete, list of harassment locations as "Clacton train station, Dewbury bus station, Harrow & Wealdstone tube station, Lewisham train station, Liverpool coach station, Liverpool Lime Street train station, Manchester central coach station, & Shude Hill bus station".

Norton Street is perhaps what you call Liverpool coach station and Liverpool Lime Street appears on both lists.

Liverpool Central and Crewe do not appear in your list and either your list is incomplete, or the article is wrong. Which is it? If your position is that the article is wrong then please say so clearly.

In view of the questions regarding the veracity your reply please provide a copy of the letter "written by a UKBA inspector based in Liverpool", with personal information removed.

I note that your earlier reply clearly claims that you discriminate against people travelling by public transport with this harassment. You state that you do not usually extend this harassment to people travelling by moving private vehicles. I take it that you include moving bicycles in that assertion. I also note that you do not include moving pedestrians in that assertion. Please confirm if these deductions are correct or not.

Please note that "replies" which involve attachments in proprietary file formats are not acceptable. A reply which is not in plain text format will be deemed to be a refusal to answer. It may only be possible to provide a copy of the letter written by a UKBA inspector based in Liverpool" in a proprietary format. In that case providing a copy of the letter only, not your reply, in Acrobat formt will be acceptable.

Yours faithfully,

David Hansen