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British lorry driver Sherralin Ballard says she was left stunned when 12 Iraqi migrants were discovered hidden in her trailer at a port in northern France.

Despite insisting to authorities that she had no idea they were in her vehicle, she says she was arrested on suspicion of being a people smuggler and held in a police cell for 15 hours.

Following a Sky News report on migrants trying to reach the UK from France, the 54-year-old from Herefordshire describes how her ordeal has left her without sympathy for the migrants desperately trying to board vehicles bound for the UK.

I went numb when a police officer told me I was being arrested. I'd done nothing wrong.

I'm not a panicker and I know how to keep control. I knew I had to keep a clear head.

But sitting in a police cell for 15 hours, reading the scribbles on the wall over and over again, thinking about my son and my mum - recently diagnosed with dementia - I started to think: "This could all go wrong for me."

I've been driving lorries for 33 years and around the continent for the last 15. I'm a sole trader and transport cargo across Europe.

After a long drive from northern Spain, I'd stopped at a service area about two and a half hours from the French port of Ouistreham to sleep.

The weather was really bad. There was heavy rain and strong winds but my vehicle was well-secured.

The next morning I arrived at Ouistreham and went through the usual security checks at the port.

Suddenly a security guard, who had looked in my trailer, came up to me and said: "You have two illegal immigrants in there."

I was totally confused. How did they get in there when the trailer was locked?

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After another search, security found 11 men and one woman who had sneaked inside and opened boxes of cargo to hide inside. They had apparently used a generic key to open the locks on the trailer.

All of the migrants were from Iraq and aged between 18 and 30.

I was so angry I confronted one of the men.

"What gives you the right to be in my trailer and cause damage?" I asked him.

"We go to England," he replied.

"What if I lose my job? Who's going to pay for this damage?" I asked.

"You won't lose your job. The damage is covered by insurance," he said.

Another of the male migrants then added: "We go to England because your country bombed ours."

I was taken to a police station to give a statement when a senior officer told me I was being arrested on "suspicion of enabling people to move through France illegally with a view to enter another country illegally".

They took my phone, everything in my pockets and left me in a police cell for 15 hours.

All I could rely on was the truth. I had no witnesses. My life was in the hands of the 12 migrants.

It would only take one of them to say I knew they were in my trailer for everything to go wrong.

It was a huge relief when I was eventually released without charge and allowed to return to England.

People are feeling sorry for these migrants trying to board UK-bound vehicles but I have no sympathy. Running away is not the answer.

Being desperate to get to England does not give them an excuse to affect my life and leave me locked up for 15 hours. I can't get that through to the do-gooders.

Ouistreham is like a warzone at night. It's chaos and horrendous to see.

It's in the back of my mind that this could happen again.

But after fighting for 30 years to do this job, I'm not going to give up that easily.