13,000 foreign criminals still living in UK jails at YOUR expense, warn MPs

THOUSANDS of foreign criminals are living in UK jails at the expense of the taxpayer, or freely in the community, because the Home Office has failed to send them home, MPs have warned.

A report by the Home Affairs Committee found that 13,000 “unwanted crooks” were still here, including 983 Poles and 635 Romanians. 

Many of the prisoners, held at a cost of £36,000 each a year, are from other EU countries. 

Brexit supporters have seized on the findings as new evidence for why Britain must vote Leave in the EU referendum on June 23. 

Vote Leave campaigner and Justice Minister Dominic Raab said: “The EU is making us less safe. 

"If we take back control we will be able to deport foreign criminals from our prisons.” 

Committee chairman Keith Vaz MP said: "Despite repeated warnings, the Home Office is still unable to remove foreign offenders from the UK.

“The public would expect our membership of the EU to make it easier to deport European offenders. This is clearly not the case. 

“We continue to keep thousands of these criminals at great and unnecessary expense. 

"These failures are undermining confidence in the UK’s immigration system and in the UK’s EU membership.”