Immigration Detention

Amy Nethery, Stephanie Silverman, Amy Nethery, Stephanie J Silverman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781317613909
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Before the turn of the century, few states used immigration detention. Today, nearly every state around the world has adopted immigration detention policy in some form. States practice detention as a means to address both the accelerating numbers of people crossing their borders, and the populations residing in their states without authorisation.

This edited volume examines the contemporary diffusion of immigration detention policy throughout the world and the impact of this expansion on the prospects of protection for people seeking asylum. It includes contributions by immigration detention experts working in Australasia, the Americas, Europe, Africa and the Middle East. It is the first to set out a systematic comparison of immigration detention policy across these regions and to examine how immigration detention has become a ubiquitous part of border and immigration control strategies globally. In so doing, the volume presents a global perspective on the diversity of immigration detention policies and practices, how these circumstances developed, and the human impact of states exchanging individuals' rights to liberty for the collective assurance of border and immigration control.

This text will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners of immigration, migration, public administration, comparative policy studies, comparative politics and international political economy.

1
‘A proud tradition’? Immigration detention in the United Kingdom

Melanie Griffiths

Introduction

British politicians often claim that the United Kingdom (UK) has a ‘proud tradition’ of providing safety to refugees. Despite the rhetoric, the last few decades have seen more emphasis on enforcement and control than on welcome and support. This includes the development of the immigration detention system: once an ‘emergency’ measure used in wartime, it is now a routine aspect of the UK’s asylum policy. The development of immigration detention and other measures, designed to deter new arrivals and facilitate the removal of others, was largely a response to political concern over a spike in the number of asylum seekers arriving in the late 1990s. In more recent years, the number of new asylum applicants has fallen, but the expansion of immigration detention has continued nonetheless. This chapter charts the development of domestic immigration detention policies over the last century. It then provides an overview of the numbers and circumstances under which asylum seekers are detained today before finally examining the human impact of detention, including its effect on vulnerable people and detainees’ mental health, and the effect of detention on asylum outcomes.

Immigration detention policy

The UK’s contemporary policy of immigration detention developed out of longstanding practices of administrative incarceration. The detention of people subject to immigration control was first codified under the 1920 Aliens Act (Welch and Schuster 2005b: 337). Internment of foreign nationals was employed in the name of national security, with large numbers of non-citizens detained during the two world wars (Silverman 2012: 1). In recent decades, immigration detention has developed from an ‘emergency’ wartime phenomenon into a tool of everyday migration management.

The 1971 Immigration Act expanded on the 1920 Aliens Act and empowered immigration officers to detain certain non-citizens, including irregular migrants and people who had over-stayed their visas. Until the beginning of the 1990s, the number of people detained was relatively low (about 200–300 people at any time), and asylum seekers were rarely detained or deported (Welch and Schuster 2005b: 337). This changed during the 1990s when a rapid increase in the number of people seeking asylum was met with legislative response. The 1999 Immigration and Asylum Act heralded a dramatic expansion of immigration detention centres and practices, broadening the categories of detainable non-citizens to include asylum seekers and others (Welch and Schuster 2005a: 402). The number of people detained at any time increased from 250 in 1993 to over 2,260 in 2003 (Schuster 2003) and, according to the Association of Visitors to Detainees (AVID), to around 4,000 in 2013 (AVID 2013).

The growth of immigration detention continued into the 21st century, particularly as governments became increasingly inclined to deport non-citizens. In 2004, Prime Minister Tony Blair famously pledged that the number of refused asylum seekers removed from the UK would exceed the number of new arrivals. The growing emphasis on enforcement led to greater allocation of resources towards the detection and detention of irregular migrants, including the development of several immigration removal centres (IRCs). Even though the number of asylum seekers entering the UK dropped substantially after 2002, the trend towards increased detention continues to increase.

Today, non-citizens can be taken into detention for administrative purposes at any point of their immigration claim. Detention is commonly justified on the basis of the perceived risk of people absconding or being a danger to the public, uncertainty over identity, the facilitation of the resolution of immigration claims, or removal from the country. Detention also serves the additional – implicit – functions of deterring new arrivals, preventing people’s ability to form social ties, and providing a ‘spectacle’ by which to assure the public that national borders are being well managed (Leerkes and Broeders 2010).

Immigration detention centres

Before the 1990s, there were no permanent detention centres in the UK. Detainees were instead held in prisons or, occasionally, in barracks, camps, or ferries (Welch and Schuster 2005b: 337). The first centre, Campsfield House, was opened in Oxfordshire in 1993, followed shortly by several others. As of 2014, there are 15 detention facilities: 11 IRCs; three short-term holding facilities (STHFs); and Cedars, a pre-departure centre for families. Aside from an IRC in Scotland and an STHF in Northern Ireland, these are located in England, clustered around London and the South East. In February 2013, the total bed capacity was 3,408 (AVID 2013) but was increased by over 800 spaces in 2014 as a result of the expansion of several existing IRCs and the redesignation of Her Majesty’s Prison the Verne into a 595-bed IRC. Around a thousand more non-citizens are held under immigration powers in police cells and Prison Service establishments. There are also plans to more than double the bed space of Campsfield House from 276 to 610.

The 11 IRCs vary in size, from Tinsley House, with 157 beds, to Harmondsworth, Europe’s largest detention centre, which has 661 beds. The STHFs are smaller at 19–38 beds. Large for-profit private security firms operate most of the centres, raising questions regarding accountability and transparency (Ackerman and Furman 2013). The Prison Service currently runs three IRCs (Dover, Haslar, and Morton Hall) and will also manage the Verne once it is redesignated. The IRCs and STHFs vary by degree of securitisation but are all prison-like ‘closed’ sites in which detainees are held against their will behind locked gates and razor-wire-topped fences. Conditions are less restrictive than in prisons: detainees can have mobile telephones and are not usually held in cells, for example.

According to Home Office statistics, a total of 30,423 non-citizens entered British immigration detention facilities in 2013, of which 46 per cent had claimed asylum (Home Office 2014b: Table dt.01). There are certain gaps in the statistics available, particularly regarding the numbers held under immigration powers in non-residential holding centres, police custody suites, and prisons, including foreign national offenders remaining in prison after the completion of their sentences (AVID 2013). According to information provided to parliamentarians, however, 1,214 immigration detainees were being held in prison at the end of 2013. Despite gaps in the available data and the continual expansion of the detention network, the total number of people held in the UK at any time under immigration powers (including within prisons) was estimated at around 4,000 in 2013 (AVID 2013) and 5,000 a year later (AVID personal correspondence).

The vast majority (around 85 per cent) of immigration detainees are men. However, 4–5,000 women are detained each year. Until recently, children under 18 years old could be detained with their families, and around 2,000 non-citizen children were detained each year (Save the Children 2005: 7). In 2012, a new process for the removal of families with children was announced, and far fewer children are now detained and for shorter periods. In 2013, 203 children were detained, of whom 70 per cent were asylum seekers, and 76 per cent were under the age of 11 (Home Office 2014b: Tables dt.02 and dt.04).

Detaining asylum seekers

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) calls for asylum seekers to be detained only in specific and exceptional circumstances – for example, when there are strong grounds to believe that the person will abscond or refuse to cooperate (UNHCR 2012: Guideline 4). Asylum seekers in the UK are not detained simply on the basis of claiming asylum. There are no special legislative grounds for their detention; rather, asylum seekers are detained on the same basis as others subject to immigration control. Asylum seekers are also susceptible to being detained on the basis of their mode of entry (which tends to make them illegal entrants) and/or lack of lawful status (Jesuit Refugee Service 2010: 415). A judicial decision is not required to carry out detention during the asylum procedure and, unless a detainee applies for bail or challenges the lawfulness of his or her detention (which is difficult without the requisite knowledge, literacy, and legal representation), he or she may never come before a court.

Although various categories of non-citizens are detained, nearly half of the total detention population has claimed asylum in the UK. During 2013, 14,145 asylum seekers entered detention facilities (Home Office 2014b: Table dt.01), a significant number given that there were a total of 23,507 asylum applications made in the UK that year (Home Office 2014a: Table as.01). Detained asylum seekers tend to hail from particular countries. At the end of 2012, just over 70 per cent of detained asylum seekers came from just 10 countries, with the top contributors being Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Nigeria, and China (Refugee Council 2013: 2). Each year, approximately 1,000 people are detained whilst facing removal to another European Union (EU) country under the Dublin Convention (an international agreement determining the EU state responsible for assessing asylum claims) (Home Office 2014a: Table as.01).

There are also an unknown number of foreign nationals who claim asylum from within IRCs or prison. However, the vast majority of asylum seekers in detention are refused applicants awaiting removal.

Asylum seekers assigned to the Detained Fast Track (DFT) are automatically detained. The DFT is applied when asylum seekers are deemed to have straightforward claims that can be decided quickly. It is an accelerated process that permits detention during the initial decision-making process and any subsequent appeal, even if the individual would not otherwise be liable to detention (i.e. removal need not be imminent, and the person does not need to be considered an absconding risk). The time from entry onto the DFT to the initial decision is under 10 days, with accelerated appeal time frames also in operation (UK Border Agency 2013: Section 2.2). In 2005, the government announced that 30 per cent of new asylum applicants would be processed through the DFT system (Silverman and Hajela 2012), although in practice the number is only 2,000–3,000 a year. DFT asylum seekers are held at either Harmondsworth or Yarl’s Wood IRCs, with 70 per cent of the former’s population being on the DFT in 2012 (Home Office 2014a: Table as.12; 2014b: Table dt.01). The DFT process has been criticised on many grounds, including that the decision-making process is too fast to be fair, and that unsuitable cases are often included, such as torture survivors and trafficking victims (Alger and Phelps 2011; Bail for Immigration Detainees 2008: 2).

People are held in immigration detention for vastly differing lengths of time. Some are held for a matter of days immediately prior to removal, whilst others remain for months or even years. Although detention is time limited in other EU member states by the EU Returns Directive 2008/115/EC, the UK has opted out of the Directive and so may practice indefinite detention. Given the variation of time frames, coupled with the fact that some individuals are released but later re-detained, data on the average length of detention can be difficult to ascertain. The Home Office also does not record how long asylum seekers, as opposed to other categories of detainees, are held for (Asylum Aid 2013: 57). However, of the 30,000 people leaving detention facilities in 2013, over a third had been detained for under a week, and just over a further quarter for between one and four weeks (Home Office 2014b: Table dt.06). Although only 3 per cent had been detained for over six months, this includes 249 people detained for over a year and 50 people detained for more than two years.

The Home Office does not publish figures on the financial cost of immigration detention, but in 2010 the government disclosed that the average overall cost of detaining a person was £120 a night (including costs incurred by incidents such as fires and people suing the Home Office for unlawful detention) (Hansard 2010). The annual cost of running Campsfield IRC has been calculated as being around £8,497,200 (Silverman and Hajela 2012: 5). The competition amongst large private firms for contracts to run IRCs demonstrates the profitability of this sector. It has been suggested that current detention practices incur unnecessary costs. For example, an estimated £75 million is wasted each year detaining people who are ultimately released rather than removed from the country (Detention Action 2013).

Experiences of detention

Immigration detention is a form of administrative detention intended to facilitate bureaucratic processes rather than punish or reform individuals. However, detain-ees almost always describe the experience as punitive, frightening, and dehumanising, with negative impacts evident in terms of people’s mental health, access to legal support, and (possibly) the chances of their receiving Refugee Convention recognition. In the UK and elsewhere, immigration detention has been shown to be harmful in that it removes people’s freedom and self-determination and isolates them from the outside world.

The Detention Centre Rules (2001) stipulate the conditions and the daily running of immigration detention centres and require authorities to provide detainees with written reasons for their detention. The operating standards for these Rules remain incomplete, however, differences exist in how they are interpreted between centres, and they do not extend to cover immigration detainees held in prisons (Asylum Aid 2013: 57). Despite the Rules, activities and facilities tend to be insufficient, health provisions are often criticised, and it can be difficult for detainees to access support and advice, including from legal representatives and community networks.

Home Office policy is to detain vulnerable people – such as the elderly, people with serious disabilities or medical conditions, or victims of trafficking and torture – only in exceptional circumstances or when their care can be managed satisfactorily in detention. Under Rule 35 of the 2001 Detention Centre Rules, IRC medical practitioners must report any concerns that detention could be harmful, that someone might be at risk of committing suicide, or if someone is a victim of torture. Despite these safeguards, Home Office policy is routinely breached in relation to vulnerable people (Bail for Immigration Detainees 2008: 2). For example, although the detention of unaccompanied minors is prohibited, around 20 or so children are detained each year before being reassessed and released as minors (Asylum Aid 2013: 56). In 2013, an 84-year-old Canadian man with Alzheimer’s died in Harmondsworth IRC in handcuffs, despite having been declared unfit for detention. Pregnant women have also been detained outside of the ‘exceptional circumstances’ allowed by policy guidelines (Her Majesty’s Chief Inspectorate of Prisons [HMCIP] 2011: 16), and the Home Office’s policy regarding the detention of pregnant women has been criticised as ineffective, unworkable, and damaging (Medical Justice 2013). Furthermore, independent inspectors have shown that some torture survivors are detained, even when they have medical evidence of their torture and Rule 35 reports have been made (HMCIP and Independent Chief Inspector of Bor...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviated words
• List of contributors
• Understanding immigration detention and its human impact
• 1 ‘A proud tradition’? Immigration detention in the United Kingdom
• 2 Guarding the external border: immigration detention in the Netherlands
• 3 Games of law and repression: immigration detention in France
• 4 Balancing control with rights: immigration detention in Finland
• 5 Fortifying the European Union? Immigration detention in Malta and Cyprus
• 6 At the border of ‘Fortress Europe’: immigration detention in Turkey
• 7 Detention of asylum seekers en masse: immigration detention in the United States
• 8 Not so short and sweet: immigration detention in Canada
• 9 Evolution towards higher standards of human rights: immigration detention in Mexico
• 10 Breaching international law: immigration detention in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba
• 11 Mandatory, non-reviewable, indefinite: immigration detention in Australia
• 12 At the discretion of management: immigration detention in Indonesia
• 13 Illegality and its uncertainties: immigration detention in Malaysia
• 14 Australian neo-colonialism in the Pacific: immigration detention in Papua New Guinea
• 15 The expansion of illegality: immigration detention in South Africa
• 16 The union of securitisation and demography: immigration detention in Israel
• Index