The Association of Labour Providers’ chairman Mark Boleat (pictured) is to due to address issues with the Gangmaster Licence and illegal workers at its annual general meeting this morning.

He said: “The main focus of the Association’s work in the last year has been the implementation of the Gangmasters (Licensing) Act.  Sadly, commentators often tend to believe that legislating is itself sufficient to deal with malpractice. It is not. If implemented well it can facilitate dealing with malpractice.  If implemented badly it can give crooks respectability.”

He added: “We are also concerned with the government’s inability to tackle illegal immigration. The government has published an ambitious strategy involving more sophisticated identity documents, stricter rules for those with non-EU passports, making it difficult for those not entitled to be in the UK to access services and a huge increase in resources for policing the borders. While this strategy may work in other sectors it will do little to tackle illegal working in the food supply industry. Most of the illegal workers in the food supply industry (and I suspect some other industries) either have forged or fraudulently obtained EU documents or simply work in the thriving cash economy. Illegal working will not be stopped unless the informal economy is effectively tackled.  It is not being.”

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