An antiques dealer familiar to millions on TV and her husband were fined £3,000 after contacting British police to report a migrant who had snuck into their van in France.
Mother of two children, Jane Cave, 56, who appears on The Bidding Room on the BBC, and her husband Ed Masters had gone through customs in Calais while travelling to purchase antiques.
They were heading through Suffolk on their way home to Norfolk when they heard noises in the back of their van and found a ‘dark, shortish [man] carrying a mobile phone.’
They informed Suffolk Police of what had transpired immediately, and the guy was taken into custody.
But they later received a letter from the UK Border Force saying they were being fined for unknowingly smuggling a migrant into the country after they failed to properly secure their vehicle.
‘We all thought we had done the right thing in calling the British police and making them aware of the situation. Little did I know the aftermath of this,’ Mr Masters, 54, said, adding the experience had made him feel like a criminal.
The couple were returning home from France on November 23 last year when they were held up at customs in Calais.
To finish the paperwork in their van for importing antique furniture and other items per post-Brexit regulations, they stopped at a supermarket.
Mr Masters was completing paperwork in his unlocked van for the crossing when he heard a noise and saw someone attempting to climb in the back.
‘I shouted ‘Get out’ which he duly did and ambled towards the rest of the car park,’ he said.
They then proceeded to customs, where the car was stopped and examined by a French border guard at passport control before being permitted entry.
Following a smooth crossing, they were driving home on the dual carriageway A11 close to Barton Mills when they noticed a ruckus coming from the rear. Upon pulling over, they discovered their stowaway.
The migrant leapt out and hid behind a petrol station before he was caught minutes later when police arrived following a 999 call.
‘That should have been done thoroughly at the border in Calais,’ Mr Masters said.
When he checked with the authorities after getting the fee letter, they told him he should have reported the first attempt to enter his vehicle to the border personnel at Calais.
Mrs Cave slammed the fine as ‘atrocious’ and said: ‘We all went into the supermarket and then Ed got an email and went back to the van to answer it on my iPad.
‘The back was unlocked while he was sitting in the front and he suddenly saw in the mirror that someone’s leg was hanging out of the back and he realised they were trying to get in.
‘Ed jumped out to get this guy out and he went off. Ed just didn’t realise that anyone else was in there.
‘When we got to the Eurotunnel terminal, we got pulled over by French customs, who opened up the van and peered in before waving us through.
‘We arrived back in the UK and drove for a couple of hours before we slowed down on the A11 in a queue of traffic before the roundabout at Barton Mills.
‘While we were nearly at a standstill, we heard this knocking and rapping from the back as if someone was asking to get out.
‘As we were stopped in the traffic, we saw people videoing us from the cars, which were nearly stationary around us. They were obviously filming this guy jumping out.
‘I saw him run off towards a garage. He was black and had a hoody on and looked like he was aged about 16.
‘Ed dialled 999 and the police told us to pull over, so we stopped at a McDonald’s and a garage on the other side of the roundabout.
‘One police officer came along and he was fine. Ed explained what had happened and this officer spent a couple of minutes checking over our van to make sure nobody else was in there.
‘It looked like the migrant had been hiding under a large shoe rack. But he had respected what was in the van and had not damaged anything.
‘The only thing he left in there was a comb. He was caught almost immediately by the police. All we were told by the police was that he was quite young.
‘The cop spent a couple of hours talking to Ed and then we continued our journey home.’
Mrs Cave said she heard nothing more until her husband got the letter around three months ago saying he was being fined £3,000 for inadvertently bringing in a migrant.
She said, ‘My first reaction was ‘Why?’ because we had not done anything wrong. We would not have called the police if we had known this was going to happen.
‘My advice now would be for anyone in the same situation to just let the migrant go off in a layby and not report it.’
She said that it was her husband who was being fined as he was the driver of the van but she and her business partner were paying the fine as it was a trip for their work.
Mrs Cave said Border Force had agreed to receive payment at the rate of £100 a month for now but had stated that all the money was due within two years.
‘We can’t afford £3,000. I think it’s atrocious. We have done the right thing and have been honest, but we are being punished for it,’ she added.
The police officer told them the migrant was being taken to temporary accommodation.
Mr Masters added: ‘If I had just dropped him in a lay-by and not notified them, we would be £3,000 better off. Utter madness.’
He claimed he had faced increased scrutiny from the UK Border Force since the incident and had been stopped four times at different airports.
A Home Office spokesman said: ‘We are fully committed to stopping people from illegally entering the country and cracking down on people smugglers.
‘The Clandestine Entrant Civil Penalty Scheme aims to ensure drivers are taking every reasonable step to deter irregular migration and disrupt people smugglers.’
A Suffolk Constabulary spokesman said: ‘Police were called at approximately 1.35 pm on November 23, 2023, to reports that a couple travelling home to Norfolk from France had discovered a male hiding in their vehicle on the A11 at Barton Mills.
‘It was reported that the couple had heard banging from within their van while they were driving near the Fiveways roundabout, so they stopped their vehicle, at which point the male, described as a teenager, jumped out.
‘Officers attended, [and] located and detained the male concerned.’
Tourists and commercial drivers are at risk of being fined if they fail to adequately secure their vehicles under the rules of the government’s civil penalty scheme.
The Home Office said the scheme ‘aims to ensure drivers are taking every reasonable step to deter irregular migration and disrupt people smugglers.’
Well, that’s simply amazing. As a result, there will be little motivation to report it in the future. Moreover, border control should bear the responsibility for their blatant negligence rather than the common person, and let’s face it, this is all down to those highly intelligent civil servants running the home office.
The vehicle had been checked by customs on the French side before boarding the ferry. They didn’t find anyone, or at least pretended not to, and let them go on their way. I wouldn’t be paying any fine as the van had already been checked and passed through, and how much is the border force planning to fine themselves for not securely securing our borders?
The Home Office spokesman said that they were fully committed to stopping people from illegally entering the country and cracking down on people from illegally entering the country and cracking down on people smugglers. Well, that’s absolute rubbish.
This is somewhat draconian. The simple answer is, don’t let them in. Close our borders completely and then we wouldn’t have all these problems, but our government wants them in: cheap labour equates to more profit for our greedy politicians.
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 