Thai officials try to persuade Glitter to return to UK

Paedophile rock star Gary Glitter was said to be in “a good mood” today as he laughed and chatted with immigration officials who are trying to persuade him on to a flight back to the UK.

The disgraced singer has reportedly been told he must get on a plane today after he refused to board two previous flights from Bangkok to London.

The next Thai Airways flight leaves Bangkok at 1.10am local time (7.10pm Irish time) and immigration officials are hoping Glitter will be on-board.

Colonel Puttipong Musikul, of Thai Immigration police, said Glitter was in a good mood today despite waiting in the transit lounge for almost 20 hours.

“Now we are talking and he seems to be (in) a great mood – laughing and enjoy(ing) chatting with our negotiators,” he said.

“It’s kind of breaking the ice first before asking him to change his mind.”

Glitter, who is travelling under his real name Paul Gadd, was released from a Vietnamese prison yesterday after serving two years and nine months of a three-year sentence for abusing two girls aged 10 and 11.

After his flight from Ho Chi Minh City landed at Bangkok last night, Glitter had been due to board a connecting flight to Heathrow but refused.

An immigration official said Glitter – who was treated for tinnitus in prison - had complained of earache and was taken to an airport clinic.

The official said he was checked over by a doctor before being returned to the transit area of the airport.

A second London-bound flight left Bangkok this morning but Thai Airways said Glitter was not on board.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said today that Britain cannot enforce Glitter’s return but must have a plan if he does come back.

Asked about Glitter while on a visit to special constables in Tooting, south London, Ms Smith said: “What I am concerned about is, whoever the individual sex offender is, that we have in place the necessary provisions to monitor them.”

Ms Smith today announced tighter controls on the movements of paedophiles but she dismissed a suggestion that the Government had wanted a “celebrity paedophile” to promote the crackdown and had found it “embarrassing” that Glitter had not come home.

“No paedophile is a celebrity, every paedophile needs to be controlled,” she said.

She told GMTV earlier today that Glitter was “despicable” and said it was “pretty hard to imagine it would be legitimate for him to travel abroad again”.

Today’s announcement included increasing the length of foreign travel orders which prevent convicted paedophiles from going abroad, from six months to up to five years.

Glitter was also treated for a heart condition while in prison and he has said he wants to return to the UK for treatment for his health problems.

Asked if she was comfortable with Glitter using the NHS and taking up police time, Ms Smith told GMTV: “I think it’s right that we use police time to monitor sex offenders.

“If you are a British citizen, you have the right to use the NHS, whatever we think about an individual, and this is a pretty despicable person.”

Thai officials last night refused to let Glitter, 64, through passport control and into the country despite his insistence that he was a “free man”.

He was told he would not be allowed out of Bangkok airport unless it was on an international flight.

Police Major General Phongdej Chaiprawat said: “We will not allow him to enter the country.”

Lieutenant General Chatchawal Suksomchit, the chief of Thailand’s immigration police, said Glitter was denied entry because under Thai immigration laws those convicted of child sex abuse in a foreign country can be barred.

He said Glitter would be taken to a detention centre if he continued to refuse to get on a flight.

A Foreign Office spokesman said: “He (Glitter) decides where he applies to go and the country or authorities there will decide whether they permit him to enter their territory.”

Glitter was convicted of downloading child pornography in the UK in 1999 after a computer repair shop found the images on his laptop and served two months of a four-month sentence.

He left the country and moved to Spain and Cuba before travelling to south east Asia where he escaped detection until he was tracked down by newspaper reporters.

He was kicked out of Cambodia after facing allegations of sex crimes and moved to the Vietnamese coastal resort of Vung Tau.

The two girls at first made allegations of rape, which carries a death sentence, but were reportedly paid off with £1,175.

He was arrested trying to leave the country and stood trial, pleading innocence and claiming he was teaching the girls English. He was convicted and sentenced to three years in March 2006.

Children’s charities have criticised Glitter’s stated intention of returning to the UK to take advantage of the NHS.

Michele Elliott, of children’s charity Kidscape, told the Daily Mail: “It makes you sick. He doesn’t even want to live here, he’s just coming to sponge off us. I can think of a lot more worthy people to give treatment to on the NHS.

“He’s an exploiter – he exploits children, he’ll exploit the NHS.”

Glitter reportedly earns tens of thousands of pounds every year in overseas royalties from his hits, which include I’m The Leader Of The Gang (I Am).

If and when he arrives back in the UK, he will be met at the airport by police officers and served with an order which effectively puts him on the sex offenders register.

The National Association for People Abused in Childhood said Glitter must be returned to the UK and then closely monitored.

“Get Paul Gadd back now and let’s keep a careful eye on him. Allow the police to do their job,” said chief executive Peter Saunders.