By Natasha Lomas, 2 August 2007 16:01
NEWS
The UK government plans to spend £1.2bn on its e-Borders programme over the next decade, as the electronic passenger-screening system is fully implemented.
The e-Borders programme requires ferry companies and airlines to submit detailed information about passengers prior to departure to or from the UK. Names that arouse suspicion can then be investigated by the Border and Immigration Agency, HMRC, Police and UK Visas before travellers have embarked on their journey.
The programme is more than two-thirds of the way through its 39-month trial period, which kicked off back in December 2004. Despite still being in its test phase, e-Borders has so far screened 29 million passengers and issued 13,000 alerts which have resulted in more than 1,000 arrests, according to the Home Office.
Immigration minister Liam Byrne said in a statement: "All our tests show [e-Borders] works and there are more than 1,000 arrests to prove it. Now we need to go further, with full-scale screening of travellers."
He added that e-Borders creates "a new, offshore line of defence - helping genuine travellers but stopping those who pose a risk before they travel".
Speaking to the House of Commons on 25 July, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said electronic screening of travellers is an essential counter-terrorism measure as the first line of defence against terrorism is overseas, where people begin journeys to the UK.
Brown said there is therefore an urgent need to scrap "old and ineffective" paper-based systems and replace them with electronic systems that allow for "real-time monitoring" and immediate, co-ordinated action.
Brown told parliament: "The way forward is electronic screening of all passengers as they check in and out of our country at ports and airports - so that terrorist suspects can be identified and stopped before they board planes, trains and boats to the United Kingdom."
Comments
There are 4 comments. Join the discussion
1. anonymous
Is this a good idea - yes, but.......
Will it trap all potential terrorists - no - see Bruce Schneier's many articles about this.
Should it be allowed to be a "trojan horse" to justify ID cards within the UK - no. For many reasons, but not least because implementing those won't fix terrorism.
2. anonymous
"Secure borders" should be a core competence of any national administration (as it has been for thousands of years).
Most people would much rather see resource (ie their taxes) put into this as a genuine Application/use of an Identity system , rather than the looming black hole of a "National ID card" for which no clear application/business case has yet been put forward to taxpayers, and vast sums of their money are at stake....
3. Karen Challinor
did it stop the last lot of terrorists setting light to cars in public places ?
not all that effective then is it
4. Radical Meldrew
Why is security by nature so intrusive and disruptive? Maybe its a predictable symptom when we consider the usual bull-headed nature of those who chose to implement it?
A good monitoring process could be nearly transparent but our ineffective systems are nothing but a pain to everybody and do nothing to combat terrorism!