FIVE illegal immigrants are to be put on a plane to Rio - with a one-way ticket.The five Brazilians will be removed from the country after being caught during a swoop on an Ipswich restaurant.

FIVE illegal immigrants are to be put on a plane to Rio - with a one-way ticket.

The five Brazilians will be removed from the country after being caught during a swoop on an Ipswich restaurant.

As later editions of the Evening Star revealed yesterday, Immigration Service officers yesterday detained the two women and three men at Café Giardino in the Buttermarket Centre.

The cafe was closed most of yesterday after the five staff were taken away for questioning after the intelligence-led swoop.

It reopened later in the afternoon, and is open for business today.

A spokesman for the Immigration Service said today that the five had possessed fake Italian and Portuguese passports, but they all turned out to be from Brazil.

He said: "They were all taken to our detention suite at Harwich overnight, where they were served with papers to say they were illegal entrants.

"They will be removed from the country during the next two to three days."

He added that the removal process was different to deportation, and meant the immigrants could apply to come back to Britain in future.

London-based Ron Sutcliffe, spokesman for national café chain Café Giardino said today that the incident had been 'disappointing'.

He said illegal immigrants applying for work was quite common in the restaurant trade, so the usual process was for new recruits to come from an accredited agency. The agency checks their documents and then each Café Giardino manager double-checks the paperwork.

He said: "We do not employ people on a casual labour basis.

"Everything done is quite legitimate and we spent time and money training these people – we're very hot on health and hygiene standards. We have suddenly lost quite an expensive resource and had to draft in staff from other cafes to fill the breach. It was distressing for the manager."

He added that the workers' tax and National Insurance payments had contributed to the national economy."

Yesterday's raid was the second at the café since it opened at Christmas 2001. Immigration officers swooped there last summer and took away several members of staff, including several Brazilian nationals.

Café Giardino was founded in Bromley in Kent in 1992 and has opened a number of outlets across the country. There are cafés throughout England from Leeds to Southampton – and it is still expanding.

Weblink: www.giardinogroup.co.uk