Over 2,000 people a year use bogus passports attempting to enter the UK

MORE than 2,000 people a year use fake papers to try to get into the UK, figures show.

Some 21,256 bogus documents were discovered between 2010 and 2020.

False passports are handed to Border Force staff daily and immigrants using them face up to ten years in jail if action is taken.

However, prosecutions have dropped from 1,200 in 2013 to just over 300 last year.

Among those to sneak in was Remembrance Day Liverpool hospital bomber Emad Al Swealmeen, 32, who got in on a fake Jordanian passport.

Last year, the UK stopped taking ID cards from the EU.

They are said to be easier to forge and made up half of the dodgy paperwork found in 2020.

Alp Mehmet, of think-tank Migration Watch UK, which collated the data, said: “Presenting false and fraudulent documents is nothing new.

“What is new — and not lost on traffickers and fixers — is that the absence of genuine documents, and even lying to an official, makes little difference to whether an illegal entrant is allowed to stay.”

He said the “absurd situation” will not change until the failure to present proper evidence of identity “leads to asylum or other protection being denied”.

Last night, the Home Office said those with false documents will be refused entry to the UK.

A spokesperson added: “We will be implementing an Electronic Travel Authorisation scheme — similar to the USA ESTA programme — to block the entry of those who present a threat to the UK.”