Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

I should make it clear to the noble Baroness that I never give up completely. In the bulk of these posts people will be capable of carrying out the duties of both immigration and customs. As I understand it, they will be a part of the border force immigration officers and will be able to carry out both functions. But not everyone will be designated. A small number of people will be left with specific responsibilities—dog handlers, for example—who, although they will be in the border force, will be customs officers focusing purely on the dog handling aspect. Rather than being a trinity, the designated customs officers are a duality of immigration and customs officer. I think that is the case but perhaps I may come back and clarify the situation before the next stage. We are aiming to ensure that the bulk of the people involved are capable of carrying out the customs and immigration functions. If we achieve that with each of the officers, it will give us huge flexibility and allow us to do so much more. If there is some confusion in the text as to exactly how they are named, I shall make sure it is clarified. However, that is what we want the bulk of the people to be able to do and the detail we are looking at here is designed to enable that to happen within the correct legal and administrative constraints.