Nigel Farage vows toughest UK penalties for firms hiring illegal migrants

Under the plans, employers would be held responsible even if they were unaware of the worker’s immigration status.

Potential punishments also include fining firms ten percent of their global revenues to clamp down on the "profiting of illegal working".

Under current legislation, businesses employing someone who does not have the right to work without carrying out the correct checks face fines of up to £60,000 for each illegal worker.

Reform’s home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf said in a statement to the Daily Express: "Under a Reform government, Britain will have the harshest penalties in the world for employing illegal migrants.

"Bosses of companies employing illegal migrants will be sent to prison, and their companies fined ten percent of their global revenues.

"There are companies whose entire business model is based on profiting from illegal working."

The announcement comes after a government crackdown on illegal working in the delivery sector, in which the Home Office announced in July it had arrested ten Evri workers who were on immigration bail, subject to strict conditions, while further inquiries took place.

Figures published in January showed visits and arrests linked to illegal working had reached their highest levels since current records began in 2019.

Some 12,791 visits took place in 2025, up 57% from 8,122 in the previous year, to businesses including nail bars, car washes, barbers and takeaway shops.

A Home Office spokesperson said: "Illegal working undermines honest business, exploits vulnerable individuals and fuels organized immigration crime.

"We are already closing the loopholes that allow illegal migrants to work in the UK by extending right to work checks to the gig economy and delivery sector.

"Employers who break the law face severe consequences, including fines of up to £60,000 per illegal worker, business closures, license revocations and prison sentences of up to five years."

It comes after Nigel Farage’s party announced it also wanted to launch “the largest military operation in the English Channel since World War Two" to stop small boat arrivals from France.

The party says the plan is in line with international law and that it will both halt small boat arrivals and act as a humanitarian response.

A Farage-led government said it would send the Royal Navy into the Channel to intercept all migrant boats there and return them to France or Belgium under a plan called "Operation Fortress".