What would we do without them?

It's official. We now know precisely why so many illegal immigrants are managing to gain access to this country.

A crack team of peers have worked long and hard to examine the reasons why so many people are managing to cross the UK's borders and slip quietly into the Black Economy.

Lord Joplin and his EU Committee on Home Affairs have burned the midnight oil and put their considerable collective intelligence to work. Was it the carbon dioxide sensors which sense exhaled breath? Was it the 'magic eye' millimetre wave scanners which can effectively 'see through' lorries? Was it perhaps the heartbeat sensor technology? How about the new biometric IDs for Non-European Economic Area foreign nationals proposed from later this year?

No. It's the fences. If we repaired the fences at Calais, we could prevent at least fifteen hundred additional immigrants gaining access to the UK.

That's it then - despatch a white Transit immediately with nail gun and roll of weld mesh. One wonders what great mysteries of the world they might turn their attentions to next?

What would we do without them?