A FORMER top British borders security official, who quit last week in a dispute about changes made to speed up passport checks, has said his reputation had been destroyed by British home secretary Theresa May.
Appearing before MPs, Brodie Clark, who was head of the UK Border Force, insisted all of the changes made to passport checks had been sanctioned by the home secretary and he had reported to her weekly. “I am no rogue officer,” he declared.
Mr Clark claimed he had been willing to accept a £100,000 redundancy offer, but this had been withdrawn at the last minute by the office, which said he could not be compensated to leave as he could yet face disciplinary hearings.
In May, the home secretary approved a pilot scheme that relaxed border checks on children travelling with a family or in a school party. She claims Mr Clark went further than allowed by dropping fingerprint checks on non-EU nationals with visas. Acknowledging that Ms May had blocked dropping fingerprint checks, Mr Clark insisted that rules in place since 2007 already allowed for this to happen when queues at air and sea ports became “dangerously long”.
Fingerprint checks were suspended on 50 separate occasions in May, June and July and seven times in August, September and October, he told the home affairs committee, chaired by Labour MP Keith Vaz. The 2007 guidance does permit border officials suspending checks on some passengers against a “watch list”, but it does not mention fingerprints, since that check came in after biometric passports were introduced.
Mr Vaz reacted with irritation to the refusal of Mr Clark’s former boss, Rob Whiteman, to release home office e-mails – which Ms May says will only be given to an official inquiry – warning him that MPs have the power to demand sight of them.
Mr Clark complained that, “Over 40 years I have built up a reputation and over two days that reputation has been destroyed.”
Meanwhile, a leaked e-mail from a border official at Durham Tees Valley airport alleges staff were prevented from checking passengers on private aircraft, and warns it creates “an unnecessary gap in border security”.