Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that refugees and asylum seekers entering at the UK border do not have their mobile (a) photos and (b) contacts seized by border authorities without the owner of the device receiving a copy of that information.

Organised crime groups involved in immigration crime are highly exploitative of vulnerable adults and children, charging large sums of money for their illegal services.

This revenue is often used to fund other forms of criminality. Phones are seized to gather evidence to establish Organised Crime Group links. The dismantlement of these Organised Crime Groups is essential to protect vulnerable migrants. Where there is no requirement to retain the mobile phone for evidential purposes, they are returned to the owner.