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Foreign criminals shipped overseas after committing offences in Britain receive staff escorts, in-flight meals and cards loaded with £2,000, it has emerged. Over 5,000 foreign nationals convicted of serious crimes were deported from Britain last year, with transporting the offenders out of the country a priority for the Government in freeing up prison space and making our streets safer. Flying the offenders, who arrived in the UK legally but forfeited their right to remain, to countries including Romania comes at a high cost to taxpayers, however.

Before they even board a plane, the foreign national offenders, or FNOs, are processed at a removal centre and assigned multiple security escorts, first to a coach and then on to an airport. After being driven to the airbases overnight or in the early hours of the morning, extra staff are recruited to restrain the FNOs, with four people assigned to each one to ensure they don't try to escape.

Once onboard the aircrafts, the offenders are secured in their seats by an escort before being served an in-flight meal and handed bank cards, pre-loaded with £2,000.

The deportation process has historically been a secretive operation, intended to attract minimal attention. A recent ITV report shed light on the realities of the scheme, however, documenting the intricacies of removing the foreign offenders - some of whom have served whole or partial sentences for murder, robbery or sexual abuse.

Alongside the hefty price tag of getting the migrants to the airport, with each flight of around 50 people requiring nearly 100 staff across seven vehicles, the flights themselves are estimated to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Each migrant is also entitled to up to £2,000 in cash as part of the Facilitated Return Scheme (FRS), meant to encourage reintegration in their home country.

While the deportation process for FNOs is distinct from the removal of illegal immigrants and the 'one in, one out' deal the government agreed with France in July, it is also subject to frequent legal challenges, often on human rights grounds.

Three criminals managed to excuse themselves from a recent flight departing a base near Heathrow for Romania on such grounds in the hours running up to departure, ITV reports.

The deportation flights, several of which take off each week, may be a necessary process but their eye-watering taxpayer costs don't make it a "great" look for a government struggling to get a hold on the migration crisis, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood admitted.

Ms Mahmood told ITV: "A voluntary removal is actually cheaper for the British taxpayer. It has long been the case that we do offer financial packages as an incentive to people to drop their claims and drop the attempts they make to stay in our country, and to board a flight and leave."

She also pledged to increase the number of deportations all-round, insisting that the 'one in, one out' deal, which returned the first migrant to Paris last week, would act as a sufficient deterrent to those thinking of settling in the UK.

"You start with a small first step and then you ramp up, which is exactly what we're going to do," Ms Mahmood said. "We have a clear agreement with the French, we will want to see those numbers increase ... I'm not going to get ahead of operational decisions.

"I want us to get to a point where the numbers that are being removed are acting as a deterrent and stop people getting on the boats in the first place.

"We have proved it can work, we've got flights off the ground. More are going this week, and we will be looking to ramp up the numbers."