Category: London
Date: 31.10.2005
Printable version
A 91Èȱ¬ Inside Out London special (7.30pm, Monday 31 October, 91Èȱ¬ ONE London) reveals that local GPs are signing up illegal immigrants to the NHS - and it's perfectly legitimate according the Department of Health.
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Undercover reporter Vivek Chaudhary joins up with a West London-based GP even though he reveals to the doctor that he's an illegal immigrant.
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Chaudhary makes it clear to the Southall doctor that he has no papers and has overstayed a tourist visa, but is still shown receiving free NHS care and a prescription.
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The doctor tells him: "It's my duty to ask for the passport... but I like to help my own people."
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Amazingly the doctor's response is perfectly above-board.
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Though most GPs would ask for some form of ID, it's not compulsory, according to the Department of Health.
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What few guidelines exist don't specify what steps a local GP has to take to make sure an overseas patient is entitled to NHS care.
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And Chaudhary, who posed as a man from the Punjab who had overstayed his visa, found illegal immigrants have access to an underground network which can find them such doctors, as well as jobs and accommodation, with no proof of identity or UK residence.
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"If loads of doctors follow this example in west London, the cost to the NHS could be huge," he says.
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"What makes it doubly annoying is that this is happening at exactly the same time as local residents like me and my family - and my baby daughter - are struggling to get registered with local GPs because the lists are full."
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Chaudhary found getting work and accommodation with no questions asked equally easy, despite having no National Insurance number and no passport.
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The latter he could have got - for a cool £15,000 payment.
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After asking around in Southall, Chaudhary found accommodation - albeit costly at between £60 and £80 per week for a small rented room sharing with several others, especially when the majority of overstayers claim their aim is to send money home to their families.
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He also had no problem walking into a job as a labourer.
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There he met several other illegal immigrants who, like him, were prepared to work for wages well below the legal minimum - usually for around £2.50 to £3 per hour - as long as it was cash in hand.
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One worker he met insisted it was easy to be an illegal in London, as long as you kept your head down and worked hard.
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And one immigration expert claims without such black market labour some sectors of industry would collapse.
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Michael Samers, Course Director for Geography, Business and the Environment at Nottingham University, says many workforces are so reliant on overstayers that, if they left, it would cause huge problems.
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He reckons around 40 per cent of those deemed illegal in Britain have arrived legally, but illegally overstayed their student or visitor visas.
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His figure equates to an estimated 100,000 overstayers in London alone.
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But Chaudhary says his experiences have shown him that it is so easy to live in the UK illegally that the numbers don't surprise him.
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"Illegal immigrants are just going to keep coming in search of a better life," he says.
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A spokesman for the Department of Health said: "The NHS is first and foremost for the benefit of people who live in this country on a lawful and settled basis.
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"Anyone who is not ordinarily resident here - eg a person who overstays on a visa - is not automatically entitled to access free NHS treatment.
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"Nevertheless, treatment which is required as a result of an emergency or that is immediately necessary will always be provided free of charge by the NHS to anyone regardless of their status or eligibility.
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"For more routine treatment, GP Practices have the discretion to accept or refuse* applications from anyone onto their lists of NHS patients. We expect practices to use this discretion with sensitivity and due regard to all the circumstances."
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* A practice can only refuse an application to join its list if it has reasonable grounds for doing so which do not relate to the applicant's race, gender, social class, age, religion, sexual orientation, appearance, disability or medical condition.
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