To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many fake British passports (a) containing and (b) not containing biometric information have been recovered by (i) the police, (ii) the UK Border Agency and (iii) HM Revenue and Customs in each of the last five years. (276829)

The lead role in protecting the United Kingdom from the use of false travel documentation is taken by the UK Border Agency Intelligence Directorate's National Document Fraud Unit (NDFU). As part of this role, the NDFU compiles statistics on all false identity documents used for international travel and detected by the UK Border Agency (and its predecessors). Current statistical collection methods do not allow for a distinction between biometric passports and non-biometric passports.

On this basis, the following table details the detections of false UK passports encountered by the UK Border Agency (and its predecessors). These figures do not constitute part of National Statistics as they are based on internal management information. The information has not been quality assured under National Statistics protocols, should be treated as provisional and is subject to change.