The Government has fined three convenience stores in the Central Belt of Scotland £40,000 each for employing illegal workers.
A Premier store on Duns Road in Gifford, East Lothian, run by Prasath Baskaran; Lochend Store in Edinburgh; and VSR Stores Lifestyle Express and Post Office in Alexandria, West Dunbartonshire, have each been hit with fines of £40,000 for hiring illegal workers.
The stores were named by the Home Office in its quarterly Illegal Working Penalties report.
Employers can be sent to jail for five years and have to pay an unlimited fine if they’re found guilty of employing someone who they knew or had ‘reasonable cause to believe’ did not have the right to work in the UK.
This includes, for example, if the employer had any reason to believe that:
- they did not have leave (permission) to enter or remain in the UK
- their leave had expired
- they were not allowed to do certain types of work
- their papers were incorrect or false
