Deliveroo's Dirty Little Secret

They are now a blight in every city centre across Britain. If they're not cluttering up the pavements, or riding dangerously on illegal E-Bikes, they're secretly eating your food, defecating in the street, and being vile to passersby. But now, a new report reveals that thousands of them are undocumented migrants, here entirely illegally.

Handlebar parasites.

The Telegraph revealed illegal migrants are making up to £500 a week by working for delivery services – including Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats

The couriers, many of whom are banned from working because of their immigration status, are then wiring cash back home to cover the cost of loans that were used to pay criminal gangs for small boat trips across the English Channel.

The newspaper went under cover to discover the side to Deliveroo and Just Eat they'd really rather you didn't know.

The Telegraph has gone undercover to speak to people smugglers, exposing carefully honed sales pitches promoting the UK as the ultimate asylum destination because working in the gig economy is “easy” and migrants are guaranteed a “free” Government hotel room.

Migrants housed in Home Office-funded UK hotels have told how they share bikes and illegal e-bikes, many modified to exceed speed limits, and work for delivery apps as “substitute” riders. Courier accounts are rented out to migrants for between £75 and £100 a week on the black market.

In 2023, the Home Office found that two in every five delivery drivers stopped during random checks were working here illegally. Since then analysis suggests that this has shot up even more with an estimated 60%-80% of Deliveroo and Just Eat riders braking UK law. A resident based in a London hotel, which is home to hundreds of male asylum seekers, said “nearly all” the hotel’s inhabitants were working as self-employed couriers to cover their Channel crossings.

The findings come a week after the number of migrants crossing the Channel hit 10,000 in record time under Labour.

The method

The Telegraph contacted people smugglers operating from Turkey, Herat in western Afghanistan, Tehran in Iran, and migrant encampments in northern France.

Their details were obtained from British-based migrants, along with those living in squalid camps in Calais and Dunkirk in northern France. The smugglers spoke in a variety of languages, including a mix of Arabic and English, Persian, Dari, Pashto and Kurdish.

They were intensely security conscious, often preferring to communicate through online messenger apps – including WhatsApp or Telegram – and voice messages that automatically deleted once played. Their telephone numbers showed that their SIM cards had been purchased in Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq.

One smuggler said what many do: “The police will find you before you even reach the shore. They’ll take you to a hotel where you’ll have everything." “The Government pays you, feeds you and they’ll even give you a good home. They won’t leave you out on the street, like in France.” He added: “You’ll find work very easily. There are easy jobs you can do while staying in hotels they put you in. All you need is a phone and a bike to make good money. People there will help you.”

A Turkish “agent” based in Istanbul said: “Life in England is good.” Speaking to a reporter posing as a migrant who had crossed from Syria into Turkey, he said: “Getting to the UK is as easy as drinking a glass of water. Many I have sent have found work with nothing more than a mobile phone and a bike."

“Delivering food is the easiest option while your case is being reviewed. Trust me, life in England is great – you’ll earn plenty.”

Substitute accounts

Some of the migrant couriers had work visas, whereas others claimed that they had found ways to bypass increasing security on the apps. One migrant rented a phone to get a substitute courier account, for which he paid £100 a week.

He said: “If you have someone’s phone with the [app] account [on it] and it asks you to prove identity with facial recognition, you just go to the account holder’s home to get it done.”

He claimed that the weakest security allows the fake courier to “log in and log off” and the real account holder to log in on their mobile phone to respond to identity checks.

One delivery rider, whose work visa meant he was granted employment, said the big-name couriers, including Deliveroo and Uber Eats, were the most popular because they were the most lucrative. However, he said new security measures were presenting challenges for those without the “correct papers”. He said: “Delivery jobs are simple and easy. You don’t need to talk much English.”

Dame Angela Eagle, the border security minister, said: ‘‘Under our Plan for Change, we are introducing tough new laws to tackle illegal working. We are extending Right to Work checks on those hiring gig economy and zero-hours workers in sectors like food delivery, and ending the use of flexible arrangements."

“Companies who try and escape this will face hefty penalties of up to £60,000 per worker, a potential prison sentence of up to five years, and their business closed.

‘‘We expect online delivery companies to step up checks they are already doing or face the consequences. We remain in close contact with online delivery companies such as Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats, who are already carrying out right-to-work checks.” ‘Voluntary rollout of biometric checks’

The excuses

A Deliveroo spokesman said the company had worked with the Home Office and “led the industry to secure our platform against illegal working”, having introduced “direct right-to-work checks” and a registration for substitute riders, with daily identity verification checks.

He added: “We are currently rolling out additional device ID checks for all riders and will continue to strengthen our controls to prevent misuse of our platform.”

An Uber Eats spokesman said the business had also worked with the Home Office to ensure couriers who use its app undergo right-to-work checks. They added that Uber Eats had launched “new detection tools to crack down on anyone attempting to work illegally on our platform” and was removing “fraudulent accounts”. He added: “Safety incidents on the Uber Eats platform are incredibly rare, and if a courier engages in any illegal or unsafe behaviour, we take a range of actions, including permanently deactivating the courier’s access to the app.”

A Just Eat spokesman said it sets “high standards and clear criteria for our self-employed couriers”, including criminal records, age, insurance and right to work checks, with the relevant documentation. He added that spot checks are carried out on couriers and that a “voluntary rollout of biometric checks” had recently been introduced. They all said riders found to have broken road rules are removed from their apps.

Clearly none of this is working, the home delivery industry is like the wild west of retail. The only way it will stop is if customers boycott them entirely.

Related:

Mass Immigration: The Deliberate Plan to Destroy Europe by Flooding it with 'Hate-Filled' Migrants