Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, many car washes found to employ illegal workers have (a) been permanently closed and (b) led to the owners jailed in each year for which information is available.

The Government takes illegal working and worker exploitation very seriously and is committed to tackling non-compliance in high-risk sectors, including car washes. Immigration Enforcement activity has intensified over the past year, with enforcement teams carrying out over 11,000 visits to businesses across all sectors suspected of using illegal workers, marking a 51% increase. These resulted in more than 8,000 arrests, a 63% increase on the same period 12 months prior.

These figures demonstrate that enforcement is having a significant impact in disrupting this illegal activity. However, challenges remain, including the informal nature of the sector. To strengthen outcomes, the forthcoming Fair Work Agency will bring a cross-government response to improve intelligence sharing to increase co-ordination across enforcement bodes.

The Government recognises that car washes can present a risk of being exploited for money laundering and other illicit financial activity. Recent enforcement activity led by the National Crime Agency (Operation MACHINIZE) has identified links between some car washes being used for money laundering and grey economy. As part of targeted enforcement, the National Crime Agency works closely with law enforcement partners, including immigration enforcement to disrupt these activities and strengthen compliance. This approach forms part of a wider strategy to tackle organised crime, protect vulnerable workers, and ensure the integrity of the financial system.

Civil penalties for illegal working remain the principal sanctions for tackling non-compliance and are designed to hold non-compliant employers to account and disrupt illegal working activity. The Home Office will actively pursue debt recovery action in every case. If the employer does not pay the penalty in full or by instalments when due, the penalty will be passed to our external specialist debt recovery agents, registered with the civil court, after which enforcement action will commence. This includes a pre-legal and legal debt recovery strategy where enforcement officers have the powers to apply a range of additional tools including Charging Orders, Attachment of Earnings, Third Party Debt Orders and Orders to Obtain Information.

The Home Office publishes online, on a quarterly basis, details of all employers who have been found liable for a civil penalty and have not paid or are not making regular payments towards the penalty.

Immigration Enforcement acts on intelligence and applies sanctions where immigration offences occur, including civil penalties up to £60,000 per illegal worker, criminal convictions with up to 5 years’ imprisonment, business closure, director disqualification, loss of sponsorship rights, and seizure of illegal earnings. We also work closely with the Insolvency Service to hold non-compliant directors to account and consider them for disqualification. Migrants working illegally face up to 51 weeks’ imprisonment (England and Wales) or 6 months (Scotland and Northern Ireland) and/or a fine.

The Home Office does not hold centrally collated data on the number of car washes that have been permanently closed or the number of owners jailed for employing illegal workers in each year.