“Illegal working hurts good business, undercuts legal workers and creates illegal profits. It also puts illegal workers themselves at great risk. By working together with employers we can level the playing field and tackle the exploitation of vulnerable migrants.” The UK Border Agency
HM Revenue and Customs has to verify a person’s ID when they register as self-employed, for CIS, tax credits etc.
One of the forms of ID can be a letter from a Government department to the applicant’s home address. If you are a failed asylum seeker you will certainly have also a letter from a government department, namely the Home Office.
This letter will say that the subject is specifically forbidden from working or claiming benefits, as the failed asylum seeker has been denied rights to asylum.
HMRC have issued an edict to their staff telling them to accept these letters as a valid form of ID for verification purposes…
If you are an employer, you will also need to make ID checks on any new employee, to ensure that you are not taking on an illegal, the UK Boarder Agency suggests that you may use a number of documents for verification including:
An official document issued by a previous employer or Government agency, e.g. HM Revenue and Customs (formerly the Inland Revenue) …which contains the permanent National Insurance number and name of the person. A P45, P60, National Insurance number card, or a letter from a Government agency may be acceptable to demonstrate a person’s permanent National Insurance number…”
Such a document will be issued once a person successfully registers for tax...
Despite the contents of the Home Office letter, staff at HMRC have also been expressly forbidden from notifying the Home Office etc of the fact that this "client group" is breaking the law when it applies to register for tax due to the "data protection" implications.
HMRC have been swift to respond to these allegations, they say:
"This article is nonsense. The letter referred to is not accepted as a valid method of identity verification by HMRC."
Abridged and more from Ken Frost’s award nominated blog: