Cyclists returning from French road trip fined £1,500 after migrant found inside bike rack on the back of their motorhome

An Essex couple who returned from a holiday in France to discover a migrant hiding in the bike rack on the back of their motorhome have been fined £1,500 by the Home Office for failing to "check that no clandestine entrant was concealed".

Adrian and Joanne Fenton told the BBC they were returning to the UK following a holiday in France when they caught the ferry from Calais and drove back to their home in Essex, arriving at 10:15pm on the 15th October 2024.

However, when unzipping the bike rack that was on the rear of their vehicle they discovered that a Sudanese migrant, aged 16, had climbed into the bicycle storage unit and clung to their vehicle for the duration of the six-hour journey.

They reported it to the police who removed the man from the bike rack, the couple shocked when, while they were travelling in Australia in December, they were told by the Home Office that they would be fined £1,500 for failure to "check that no clandestine entrant was concealed".

The fine is now being appealed, the Home Office claiming that the penalty is "designed to target negligence rather than criminality". Mr Fenton has argued that it will "only encourage travellers in this position not to call the police but to let the stowaway abscond".

"At no point did I believe I would be fined by taking correct and moral action," he responded to the fine. Speaking to BBC Radio, Mrs Fenton explained that the bike rack and cover had not been inspected by border officials in Calais or on arrival in the UK.

After a six-hour journey, Mrs Fenton recalled her husband unzipping the cover to the rack and noticing two trainers.

"He's gone 'Jo, you need to phone the police. We've got a stowaway," she told the JVS Show on BBC Three Counties Radio, before explaining how she offered the man water and he replied, "Thank you."

Video footage shows police assisting the man from the rear bike rack before sitting him down on the floor of the Fentons' garage. The couple are challenging the fine on the basis that he technically was clinging to the outside of the vehicle and was not aboard the motorhome, the Home Office charge accusing them of failing to "check that no clandestine entrant was concealed in the vehicle".

A Home Office email also stated that the "entrant" was discovered by an authorised search officer, that despite the police having been called by the couple, alerting the authorities to the situation.

Conservative MP Sir John Whittingdale, the couple's local member of Parliament, has written to the Minister for Border Security and Asylum Dame Angela Eagle to raise their concerns.