Immigration enforcement activity is intelligence led and targeted, focusing on known risk, harm, and noncompliance rather than randomised inspections.

Clamping down on illegal working continues to be a critical part of this Government’s work to restore fairness, order and control within the immigration and asylum system. As such, through the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025, the Government has introduced tough new laws to clamp down on illegal working. This means that for the very first time, the Right to Work Scheme and associated civil penalties for non-compliance, will be extended to cover companies who contract workers to provide services under their company name; such as online delivery platforms in the gig economy, to conduct checks on a person’s right to work, and be liable for sanctions where illegal working is identified.

Alongside legislative change, the Home Office continues to engage with a range of businesses, including delivery companies operating in the gig economy, to promote compliance with illegal working legislation. This includes raising awareness of right to work requirements, supporting the use of compliant right to work checks, encouraging the use of robust identity and verification checks and taking enforcement action where employers or facilitators are found to be exploiting migrants or failing to meet their legal responsibilities.

The Home Office and the Department for Business and Trade have been working closely with major food delivery platforms. In 2025, Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat committed to increasing the use of facial verification checks and fraud detection technology to ensure only account holders and their registered substitutes can work off their platforms. This strengthened industry standard has resulted in the firms increasing the quantity and sophistication of checks they already conduct, with checks taking place daily.