03 October 2006
02 October 2006
This week the Customs and Immigration Service has taken a significant step to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of its law enforcement responsibilities by the amalgamation of the Immigration Frontier Teams and the Customs Anti-Smuggling teams. This has allowed, in turn, the Service to significantly increase the size of its Investigation Unit.
This is a logical step following the merger of the old Customs and Excise Department and the Immigration and Nationality Department under one Head of Service in 2005.
Until now the Service’s Immigration Officers and its Customs Anti-Smuggling Officers had been on separate shift rosters which restricted any coordination at the harbour and airport controls. The new structure will see Customs Officers and Immigration Officers working alongside each other to provide the frontier controls. A carefully planned training programme has been put in place to help officers undertake their new increased responsibilities.
This joint approach to the frontier controls gives the opportunity for the Service to allocate more officers to its Investigation Unit. The Unit is responsible for developing intelligence on criminals engaged in commercial drug smuggling and other Customs and Immigration offences. This is in line with the Service’s policy of intelligence led policing of the frontiers, concentrating on identifying and catching the criminals and allowing the innocent public to travel with as little hindrance as possible.
As far as the travelling public are concerned there will be little obvious sign of the change in structure apart from the fact that all Customs and Immigration officers will now be in uniform.
Mike Robinson, the Head of the Customs and Immigration Service, says: “This initiative is an exciting development for the Service. Not only does it improve efficiency and allow us to increase our emphasis on the intelligence led approach but it provides our officers with a more varied and interesting career within the Service. It has been welcomed by both officers and management and we are all determined to see it succeed.”
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