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TUESDAY 4 FEBRUARY 2003 __________ Members present: Mr Chris Mullin, in the Chair __________ Memoranda submitted by Immigration Law Practitioners' Association and Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees Examination of Witnesses MS NICOLA ROGERS, Member of the Executive Committee, Immigration Law Practitioners' Association, and MRS SALLY TARSHISH, Honorary Secretary, Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees, examined. Chairman
(Ms Rogers) I am Nicola Rogers. I am on the Executive Committee of the Immigration Law Practitioners' Association. We represent over 1,100 immigration practitioners who work in the field of immigration and asylum. (Mrs Tarshish) I am the Honorary Secretary for the Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees which is a registered charity founded in 1994. We have a membership of 18 volunteer groups which represents around 350 individuals who visit the nine removal centres in the UK with the exception of Northern Ireland. We are here presenting and representing the experiences of our membership and welcome the opportunity to make such recommendations as we hope you will accept. (Mrs Tarshish) No, we are privately run. We get money from various trusts but we receive no government funding. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, we are a registered charity. David Winnick (Ms Rogers) Solicitors, barristers and people who are interested in the law. Some of our members are students, for instance, or law professors and such like, but most of them are solicitors and barristers. (Ms Rogers) In order to be a member of our organisation, if a person is practising in law, they must be regulated by either the Law Society or the Bar Council and that is our very strict criteria for membership. So, all our members are regulated; they are part of a regulated profession. (Ms Rogers) I think as an organisation we have real concern. We have concern that the level of debate is such that often the information that is around is inaccurate, based on false premises and there is a real concern that the public is in fact not having a debate, if there is a debate as such, at an appropriate level. (Mrs Tarshish) I think we would support what Nicola is saying here, that there is not a proper debate and the use of terminology being bantered around and confusing the general public as to what the real issues are is very disturbing and makes disturbing reading. If we are going to approach this in a rational and reasonable manner, we must make sure that the terms of reference we use are clear, understood and shared by all of us. (Ms Rogers) Inevitably, practitioners who come into contact with asylum seekers and immigrants on a daily basis will have a particular perspective. Whether we are biased, I am not sure that that is a charge that is well met. The fact is that we experience on a daily basis injustices to our clients. If those clients were in the criminal justice system, we might have the same concerns. It is the injustice to them that we are concerned about rather than that we have a particular slant to portray. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, I would. It think it is very important to understand that just because we are a volunteer group that we have a vested interest in such that might lead us into pursuing avenues that would bias or make us not see somehow things in a clear light. I do not think that is true. I think that our membership have experiences and have seen injustices, bearing in mind that our organisation is focused on detention. Our membership has very little to do with people out in the community. So, we are talking about a very small proportion of people. We do see injustices and they are very disturbing. (Ms Rogers) I think the experience of our members is that the quality of initial decision making is poor and that is borne out to some extent by the number of successful appeals there are against initial decisions. I think the reason why initial decision making may be poor is lack of training and the quality of persons who engage in that initial decision making. It is my understanding that there is not even a requirement now for a person to be an asylum determinator, a person who determines asylum claims, to have A levels. In my submission, that would explain a lot why initial decision making may not be of the highest quality. Furthermore, it is not necessarily based on a wealth of information that is accurate and up to date and that of course will affect the quality of decision making. (Ms Rogers) It is not because they do not possess A levels. A levels are not after all the answer to everything and I am not suggesting that people who do not have A levels are not necessarily - (Ms Rogers) Absolutely, but I am concerned here about the criteria and the training and the level of education of people who undertake these jobs. Asylum claims are legally and factually extremely complex and that has to be borne in mind. Whilst A levels may not be the answer to everything, they may demonstrate the extent to which the Government are prepared to put resources into this, expensive resources because people who are better educated generally speaking command higher salaries. (Ms Rogers) Yes. I am also suggesting that a lack of training and, furthermore, a lack of up- to-date and accurate information adds to poor quality decision making. (Ms Rogers) Taking the example of Iraq, on the face of it, an Iraqi Kurd would have a well-founded fear of persecution, but there do come complexities depending on where, for instance, the asylum claimant comes from within Iraq. There are suggestions, for instance, that if you come from the Kurdish autonomous zone, you could receive safety in that zone and then you get into quite difficult legal questions about whether or not the Kurdish autonomous zone is capable of offering state-like protection within the meaning of refugee law and actually it becomes quite a difficult question to answer. I wish that all Kurds from Iraq would be offered asylum straight off and the public might feel that they are being offered asylum straight off. In fact, they are being rejected with quite some frequency. David Winnick: Having said to you that it is an obvious case, surely it is the duty of the authorities in the United Kingdom to make sure that those who claim what they are are not possibly, for all we know, agents who have been sent in by the regime in the same way as in the 1930s. The security authorities in the United Kingdom had to be absolutely sure - Chairman: Mr Winnick, where is this taking us? David Winnick (Ms Rogers) Absolutely but, if I understood your line of questioning before, you were asking me about quality of decision making. That decision about whether or not someone would be in breach, for instance, of national security is a very, very technical question and I would suggest that someone would have to be highly qualified in order to make that assessment. (Ms Rogers) It might be obvious to you and I but, in legal terms, it may be more complicated and certainly the decision making of the Home Office demonstrates that it is made more complicated by the manner in which the decisions are made. (Ms Rogers) I am concerned about country of origin information for two reasons. Often country of origin information, by its very nature, is out of date and I appreciate that there is a difficulty in obtaining absolutely up-to-date information. However, the experience of the past shows that the Home Officer has been complacent in relying on old data and old information and what has been the experience in the past is that often refugee flows happen before information filters out of the country suggesting that there is a problem. Sometimes because of the regime, censorship within the regime and lack of access by independent organisations. Sometimes it is difficult to get information in and out and I do appreciate the problems that IND might have in that regard. However, they would help themselves enormously, in my submission, if they would better source their information and give a more accurate and rounded picture in some cases of what the country situation actually is. (Ms Rogers) It is very difficult for me to identify information. Really, you had better ask the security services what information they need in order to identify terrorists. I am afraid to say that I am not an expert on how to identify a terrorist. However, in respect of how to identify an asylum seeker, a claim must obviously be looked at against the most up-to-date and accurate background information about the country of origin. (Ms Rogers) I take the view that a person who faces inhuman or degrading treatment or torture in their country of origin should not be returned, that it would be a breach of the UK's obligations as a result of the European Convention on Human Rights. That is an obligation that we cannot derogate from. In the UK, there is extensive anti-terrorism legislation. If a person is even engaged in collecting information that might lead to terrorist acts either in the UK or outside, they can be prosecuted and it has been our organisation's position that the answer is not to send them back if they would face inhuman or degrading treatment or torture, the answer is to prosecute them if the evidence exists against them. (Ms Rogers) I do not accept that we cannot derogate in any way from our international obligations. Those are obligations we signed up to in 1950 and indeed the UK was part of drawing up the European Convention on Human Rights. It is abhorrent to suggest that a civilised democratic society would wish to send a person to face inhuman or degrading treatment or torture or indeed death and, as I said, it has been long held the view of this organisation that if there is evidence that those persons had been engaged or would be engaged in terrorist activities, then by all means prosecute them. (Ms Rogers) Legally, I think there is a real problem with non-suspensive appeals and sending back people in the manner in which you describe and that is that each case has to be looked at on its merits and what I am concerned about is presumptions and rubber-stamping. As we have talked about quality of decision making, if a lower grade civil servant is given a presumption that a case is going to be clearly unfounded because the person comes from a country, the examination into that claim would probably be much less rigorous than if there is no presumption automatically applied. In my submission, non-suspensive appeals are extremely dangerous. They are dangerous because, even if only one person were sent back and were tortured or suffered ill-treatment in a situation which could have been avoided by having a suspensive appeal, that is one person too many. (Ms Rogers) I do not have - (Ms Rogers) This legislation has only been in operation for a very, very short period of time. I do not have that data at the moment. However, I can give you an example from last week where someone was sent to Romania who was in fact Turkish. Why was he sent to Romania when he was in fact Turkish? Because he was wearing the same coloured jumper as the man who should have been removed. Unfortunately because everything went so quickly, his legal advisers could not stop him being removed and, when he arrived in Romania, the Romanian authorities said, "Sorry, this person -" Miss Widdecombe (Ms Rogers) He was not tortured but there are - (Ms Rogers) As I said in answer to the question, these non-suspensive appeals have not been in operation very much and that information has not filtered through to me. Miss Widdecombe: Then the answer is "no". David Winnick (Ms Rogers) I do not accept it because it is not simply the case that a person may face torture or inhuman or degrading treatment at the hands of their own authorities, they may face that at the hands of non-state agents and it may be the fact that - (Ms Rogers) Yes and the authorities are able to protect them and it is the case that, in some countries, the authorities may not be able to protect them and that is a question of evidence that has to be looked at in the individual case. (Ms Rogers) After the due process of law and, in my submission - (Ms Rogers) After an independent review by an independent decision maker - (Ms Rogers) Absolutely not. It is perfectly possible to have an appeal system that is efficient and speedy that can hear an appeal in a sufficiently fast amount of time without putting even one person at risk. (Mrs Tarshish) I would like to make some comments on what Mr Winnick has been asking. Just to go back one or two stages about the initial decision making, I concur with Ms Rogers that the evidence we have is that about 50 per cent of the decisions are overturned at judicial review. So, clearly the initial decision making is not as effective as it should be. The other point we would like to make is that, at this stage, the process and initial decision making is not subject to any external scrutiny. It is an administrative decision and we feel quite strongly that this is something that should be addressed. (Mrs Tarshish) No, I am not talking about non-suspensive appeals, I will come to that in a moment. I just want to make this abundantly clear. Our membership feels that there should be some external scrutiny right from the word go. Also, there is quite a lot of factual information that is up to date. I have here in front of me a piece from the Home Office concerning a Ukranian who committed suicide last week in Haslar. The information on torture in the Ukraine is very detailed indeed - that comes from the Home Office website. Regarding non-suspensive appeals, I think it is important to understand that we have no idea whether we are visiting or have any contact with somebody who may or may not be a terrorist, we are just visiting somebody who is detained, and it seems to me that the idea that somebody can be removed from the UK but that they are still entitled to make an appeal is fraught with impracticalities. How would they know? How would it work? Mr Clappison (Mrs Tarshish) Roughly speaking. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. (Mrs Tarshish) It is significant and must be taken into account. (Ms Rogers) That is right and I think it predetermines the question almost and that is the problem. (Ms Rogers) Although the Government announcement suggested that there was not a white list, it does, in our view, amount to a white list insofar as there is a presumption that those countries are to be safe and that a case from those countries is clearly unfounded. There is an opportunity for that list to be expanded should the Government seek to do so. At the moment, they are the 10 accession countries, the countries that are forerunners to the EU. My understanding is, however, that a claim can be certified as clearly unfounded for other reasons. However, at the moment, those detained at Oakington, which is where these clearly unfounded cases are being dealt with, are from the 10 accession countries. (Ms Rogers) That is my understanding and, furthermore, although the Home Office may take the view that those countries are safe, there are claimants who have won on appeal, Polish Roma for instance, before special adjudicators very recently in making out a claim as a refugee and, in my submission, that shows the point that there are people from those countries who can make out a claim and a presumption against them is very dangerous. (Ms Rogers) I think the system of certification is actually unhelpful whichever way it goes. It would be very nice that whole groups of people could not have their claim automatically unfounded, but I think a system of certification becomes a system that is almost self-serving. We are looking to certify one way or another rather than just getting on with the business of looking at the case. Experience has shown in the past that trying to make two-tier/three-tier/different streams of systems actually ends up making the whole system more inefficient. I think that the most efficient way is to look at each case on its basis and just on with the business of assessing the claim, although of course there are certain claims that we would not want on a so-called white list, but we would argue against a white list in any event. (Ms Rogers) Absolutely and it also leads on to different problems. When a system is inefficient, you have decision making that becomes slow and people who remain on the territory for a very long time waiting for a decision. As they are people, they form human ties; they might get married; they might have children. In the meantime, while they are waiting for their decision, they form links that then mean that they do not want to leave whatever the outcome of their asylum claim. Quite understandably. If a person arrives in the country, meets someone, falls in love and gets married, it is quite understandable that they then do not want to leave after four years. So, the inefficiency of the system also leads to other problems other than simply public perception, but I think that, if the system were more efficient, it would certainly allay the public fears that people are allowed to remain here beyond the time that is necessary. Miss Widdecombe (Ms Rogers) I am afraid, I do not. You would have to ask the Home Officer that. (Ms Rogers) Do not have documentation? (Ms Rogers) It does not necessarily surprise me because, if they fleeing countries of persecution, they are not necessarily going to avail themselves of their authorities to get documentation. (Ms Rogers) I do not necessarily agree with that at all. I think the question of whether someone is a refugee is not dependent on whether they can produce a passport. Chairman: It does help if they tell you which country they come from. Miss Widdecombe (Ms Rogers) Absolutely but I do not have statistics. Chairman (Ms Rogers) That is the experience of that contractor and I cannot really comment on it, although I did notice that he qualified his evidence in relation to other countries. So, it may be a particular problem in relation to those people, but I am not going to comment on what is within his knowledge and not within mine. (Ms Rogers) That is not my experience, no. (Mrs Tarshish) Can I make a -? (Ms Rogers) I can only speak from my personal experience. My personal experience is that I have not come across many cases at all, in fact I am thinking hard to think of any case, where someone has turned out to be a different nationality from what they claimed to me, but I am their representative and I am to put their claim forward as presented to me. (Ms Rogers) The evidence that was put forward, as I understood it, last week - and I did read the transcript - was in relation to a particular national group and it was highly qualified in relation to other groups, highly qualified. I do not have any other experience of that, so I cannot really add to it. (Mrs Tarshish) I was going to add to what Nicola Rogers was saying. We have never had that experience of people suddenly changing nationality half-way through the conversations with them. Also, I think it goes back again to having a better quality decision-making process right at the start that would enable you to sort out the genuine people from those who do not have a genuine claim and that, if this is happening, then it is a demonstration that things are not working well at the initial stages. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, but it is not beyond the wit of the Government to try and find ways to sort this out. We know that it is difficult. We know that it is endemic and that there are organisations and the police etc trying to find this out, but I am talking about when they land in the borders of this country that the decision making at that stage would surely - this is just what you are saying - indicate that it needs to be monitored and processed in a better way than it is now. It is not successful. Bob Russell (Ms Rogers) My understanding is that the majority of asylum claims do originate from people of Roma descent and the problems arise in relation to the fact that they do not receive sufficient state protection against acts of persecution. (Ms Rogers) That is my understanding. (Ms Rogers) Happily, the minister announced that there will be immediate free movement for citizens of those countries following accession to the EU and I understand the programme is 2004. Bridget Prentice (Ms Rogers) We are not there to make moral judgments about people, we are there to represent them, in the same way - (Ms Rogers) As a lawyer, if they tell me that they are telling a lie, I cannot go to court and tell that lie for them. In the same way as if I were representing someone who was charged with a criminal offence, if they tell me that they did in fact do it but that they do not want to plead guilty, then I cannot represent them. I am there to represent their position, I am not there to make moral judgments about whether or not - (Ms Rogers) If their case falls below the standard of international law and they would not fit within the 51 Convention, then of course I will advise them. I will say, "The state of the law is this and I am afraid to say that your claim, as compassionate or sympathetic as I might be to that claim, does not fit within the law." Of course, I cannot argue it otherwise when I go to court. (Ms Rogers) We do not give advice of that nature. We do not actually advise members. We train them on how to properly use the immigration law. (Ms Rogers) If we felt that the organisation was bringing lawyers into disrepute, we may seek to expel a member and certainly we have powers to expel members who bring the organisation into disrepute by bringing the profession into disrepute, but your constituents, and indeed you, should use the office of the Immigration Services Commissioner to complain about representatives who mislead. (Ms Rogers) I am afraid I do not have data off the top of my head. (Mrs Tarshish) We have some figures for the length of detention in removal centres if that is what you mean, but that - (Mrs Tarshish) It might be but the problem is that many people in detention centres, or what are now called removal centres, have been detained from port of entry on arrival and there are not sufficient figures and documentation to know the precise number. I only have anecdotal evidence on that. For example, in one of the groups, it is around 17 per cent who are detained from arrival in the removal centres and they may not have even entered the asylum process at all until they get into the removal centre. So, it is a very complicated description that would be needed to help you to identify what stage they are at. (Mrs Tarshish) We have from our visitors - remember that this is anecdotal, so we do not know whether it is the tip of an iceberg or all that there are - that the usual problems seem to be travel documents, lack of available seats on flights, some really very practical problems, and sometimes - and this seems to be very rare - with identity and nationality. (Mrs Tarshish) I said rarely, so I think I can only actually think of one or two. (Mrs Tarshish) Rarely. (Mrs Tarshish) Very rarely. (Ms Rogers) Can I come in on this point. I think there are certainly delays. Some of those delays are in relation to particular countries. There are some countries that the UK find it very difficult to remove people to. That is (1) because of documentation or (2) because we do not currently have very good relations with that country or we do not have direct flights. There is also, however, evidence that people are being detained for very long periods of time which are, in certain cases, wholly unjustified. The subject of detention I know will come up but one has to look at the necessity of detaining in those circumstances. (Ms Rogers) If there is no prospect of removal, I cannot see how detention can be justified. (Ms Rogers) What I am concerned about and my organisation is concerned about is practices by the Home Office of not giving information to representatives or to individuals because they fear that the individual will abscond, not necessarily on any assessment of that individual, just on the general basis of, "We fear people will abscond if we tell them information, so we will not tell them." What our members find is that, time after time, people are being detained pending removal when they go and sign on, when they have been signing on regularly and in conformity with the law or they are taken from their homes without due notice. Representatives then find it very difficult to find out where the person is taken to and what steps are being taken and our experience is that communication between representatives and the Immigration Service is extremely poor at the point of removal and that in itself can then lead to delays. (Ms Rogers) You would have to ask the Immigration Service how many people but, in my experience, large numbers are taken from their homes. What one has seen in the recent past is that the Immigration Service targets what we would call soft targets, families who will be at home, rather than the young male asylum seeker who has failed all his claims because he will not necessarily be sitting at home waiting from the Immigration Service. I have concern about the method of detaining families in particular pending removal. They may well be a very well-established family in the sense that they have been in the country for some time and an immigration officer arrives at the door and they are given literally moments to pack up their lives. That can be very, very distressing and the people that I have met in detention post that happening to them are extremely distressed. It will cause delay in the long run in removal because distressed people are unlikely to co-operate or may not co-operate in the future and it is understandable. If people feel that their lives are still not closed, as it were, that they have not had the opportunity of closing that book, coming to terms with what is going to happen to them and moving on, then they may have cause to try and prolong their stay here. (Ms Rogers) If one compares, for instance, prisoners, a prisoner who is post-conviction will enter into a programme that prepares them ultimately for their release, that release being normally into the community. There is nothing in the Immigration Service way of doing things, either in detention centres or prior to a person being detained, which prepares a person for what ultimately is going to happen to them. In fact, to some extent I think there is a shutting-off and everyone in the system does not look to the end point at what is going to happen to the person. Preparing the person for release may actually assist them in coming to terms with what happens. They may become much more co-operative, they may voluntarily decide to leave if they are prepared for that. Preparation could take the form of assisting them to get their belongings together and pack up their lives, giving them adequate time to do that and adequate time to consult with their representatives and to know that there is no other avenue for them and that is the end of the process for them. If they have adequate time and facilities to be able to pack up their lives, I think the Immigration Service will find that people are more co-operative. (Ms Rogers) It depends on the individual. For some people it may take a few days, for others, if they have a large business in the UK, have a home, a mortgage etc, it may take a little more time than that. (Ms Rogers) Some people who are subject to removal are permitted to work. It is only now that the Government have withdrawn the work concessions for asylum seekers that per se asylum seekers cannot work as of that time, but previously people had work permission. People who are subject to removal are not just asylum seekers and I think we have to make that very clear. People may be subject to administrative removal or deportation who were here in the UK on another basis other than claiming asylum. We are not simply talking about asylum seekers, we are talking about people who may have been here legally in an immigration capacity and have overstayed their stay, as it were. (Ms Rogers) That is a very good question and probably, in spite of their situation, they do their best. I do not know. They may have family; they may have friends. (Mrs Tarshish) We have no statistics to clarify the extent of the problem and particularly under the new NASS arrangements whereby single applicants will have to support themselves with the withdrawal of financial support. I have no figures for this. I imagine it will be dreadful. I think it is repugnant. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) This is under the new NASS arrangements if you are a single person and your case is unsuccessful, you have no means of financial support other than perhaps going on the street with a begging bowl. (Mrs Tarshish) They may be very lucky, but I can tell you that, where we are, that is not the case. They depend on the local community to help. (Mrs Tarshish) I believe so. (Ms Rogers) That is my understanding. At the end of the process. There are other groups of asylum seekers who are not entitled to support now as a result of the new legislation prior to that - (Ms Rogers) Yes, but at the end of the process, yes, they will not be entitled to NASS support. That is my understanding. Bridget Prentice (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. (Mrs Tarshish) The removal? (Mrs Tarshish) I do not know that I am in a position to actually inform you on that. How can you make it more smooth? I think we would suggest that the Immigration Service look at creating something like an independent welfare officer who helps to monitor and progress smoothly the departure from the time the determination and the process is completed to the time of removal. If you had somebody that had some sort of independent oversight of this, then I do not think that many of these problems would be half as gruesome as some of the instances we have come across are. (Ms Rogers) I think that a system can be made more efficient if you have the co-operation of everyone within the system and I have identified the ways in which you seek their co-operation. (Mrs Tarshish) It is important that these people have time to get together whatever small belongings or things that are theirs. They should have the time and the ability to collect them. If you collect people and remove them without giving them that, they are bound to be upset. These are their personal possessions. They belong to them. They have a right to them. Chairman: Yes, we understand that. Bridget Prentice (Mrs Tarshish) That is not our evidence, you see. That is what is so distressing. People are picked up and whisked away without a chance to settle things and that is very undignified and is inhumane. (Mrs Tarshish) If it is finished and they have legitimately come to the end of the process and they are unsuccessful, then the departure, as it were, should be done as humanely and efficiently as possible and I think there is a very real problem, that it does not work well and that the Immigration Service make a rod for their own back by not conducting it in a dignified and humane manner. (Mrs Tarshish) I am afraid that I do not know what humanitarian protection exactly means because I thought that we are all probably entitled to protection of a humanitarian kind in a civilised society. I find this new phrase worrying because I do not understand whether they mean it to narrow down the obligations that they have to just meeting the basic human needs and I think, for what it is worth, that exceptional leave to remain actually has quite a reassuring resonance to it: 'exceptional' because it alerts us to some degree of compassion and 'leave to remain' gives to the person a degree of certainty, even though I know it is a fairly short period. I think the removal of leave to remain is a rather sad omission. (Ms Rogers) Exceptional leave to remain was granted in a variety of circumstances to give effect to the UK's obligations under other international human rights instruments other than the 51 Convention and, to my mind, there is no difference between calling it exceptional leave to remain or calling it humanitarian status, if it is to give effect to those obligations. There were a number of announcements concerning the high levels of exceptional leave to remain. Those high levels of exceptional leave to remain were granted by the Home Office itself. They were not granted by some arbitrary outside person who inflicted this upon the Home Office. The Home Office granted it and that was to recognise the humanitarian situation in which people find themselves. I cannot see how calling it humanitarian protection will change anything other than give a new name to something. Ironically, humanitarian protection may more accurately describe it but, if we are looking at offering persons security, where there are humanitarian reasons and international human rights law reasons why they cannot be returned to their own country, then the change in name makes very little difference to me. It is very, very important, in my organisation's submission, that people who are non-returnable because their countries are in such a state that they cannot be returned, such as civil war or there are humanitarian reasons why they personally cannot return, are given security, stability and status here and they do not become part of a fractured population. It is very important that they remain within the law and the way to do that is to grant them status. What you call it does not matter much providing that with that status comes a degree of security, a degree of understanding about how long they are to remain here and on what basis they remain here and that they are given access to public services because, if you keep people outside of that system and you just do not give them a status at all and you say, "We will tolerate you here, but we are tolerating you because we cannot return you, we are not going to give you security", you put people outside the law and you force them into situations where they have to beg or work illegally or do whatever they can to survive and that is not good for public perception and that is not good for this country. Bridget Prentice: Why do you think the Home Office has made this change? What do you think they are intending to achieve by it? Chairman: That is a question to put to the minister, I should have thought. Bridget Prentice (Ms Rogers) I suggest it was window dressing. I would suggest that unless there is some intention to denigrate the status and to give it to less people and, as I have suggested, that will not work and it will put people outside the law, it is window dressing. (Mrs Tarshish) That is very sinister. (Mrs Tarshish) I do not think I can comment on that. Somebody who comes here as an economic migrant might have been starving in the place from which he or she comes. I do not feel I can make those sort of judgments. Looking at the Home Office statistics, you have 10 per cent in 1998 who were given exceptional leave to remain, in 2002 you have 25 per cent, so I can only attribute some sinister interpretation to it, thinking, "Is it becoming too popular? - therefore let's stop people using that as a term," or is it that there just simply are more people who need the protection of the exceptional leave to remain? They need it because they live in places to which people cannot be returned that easily. (Mrs Tarshish) I do not see how that can equate, because how can you possibly return people to a country where you know, for example, the United Nations has not decreed a cessation clause? How can you possibly return people when some of the Home Office websites show that these places are not safe? I think this is impossible. (Ms Rogers) Could I come in on that? Chairman (Ms Rogers) When the word "abuse" is used, I think we have to recall in this context that these people do not grant themselves exceptional leave to remain; it is the Home Office that grant them, in recognition of the fact that they cannot be returned for whatever reason, personal or civil war or whatever reason. If you look at the statistics and you look at who has been granted exceptional leave to remain in the last few years, t hey are Iraqi Kurds, they are people from Sierra Leone; further back they were people from the Democratic Republic of Congo - countries where we had in fact intervened on a military basis because the situation was so bad there. It is not surprising. I think it would be very wrong to say, "You do not qualify as a refugee. We cannot return you but we are not going to give you a status" and that was my point earlier. Bridget Prentice: Thank you very much. Chairman: Thank you. Mr Prosser. Mr Prosser (Ms Rogers) It would be interesting to ask the Minister what the abscontion rates are. Certainly the research that was done by the organisation Bail for Immigration Detainees last year suggested that abscontion rates for people who are granted bail, for instance, are very low. I think there is a perception that people will behave in a certain way whereas there is no evidence necessarily to suggest that. It is a case of it would be better actually to research into this area before drawing conclusions about the way in which people would behave. I have suggested that a better system is one where you seek the compliance and cooperation of the individuals concerned. (Ms Rogers) I am not suggesting for one minute that it is easy. Preparing someone for removal is not going to be an easy task, but it is possible. I have seen myself very careful work by some individuals in order to prepare someone for removal and people will respond. I am not saying everyone, but I think you will find that the response rate is good, but it requires hard work on the part of everyone in the system to understand that and to seek the compliance of people. (Ms Rogers) If you look at failed removals, for instance, where a removal has not been able to take place - and I believe you heard evidence last week of instances where people had become abusive or badly behaved on the plane and the removal had to be ceased, and probably recommenced the next week, maybe with an escort - I have spoken to a number of detainees who have come back from that situation and I have tried to understand why it is they have behaved like that. One of them, for instance, told me that he had behaved like that because he still had an outstanding appeal and he had not had the opportunity of having it. In fact his representatives had to intervene and, indeed, the removal was stopped. Another detainee told me that he had behaved like that because he had not received all his possessions and he was not getting on a plane until he had them. That is actually quite a simple process. Whilst we here all seem to appreciate that as being the humane and proper way to proceed, in fact it is not happening. It causes a lot of expense, quite apart from the distress to the individual involved and to everyone around involved - expense for failed removals and aborted removals because the process was not properly thought through first and everything was done in a little bit of a hurry, so that the individual did not feel they had had a proper opportunity to finish up their affairs here. That is a great sadness and also an injustice to the people who are working within the system, because it cannot be easy for them either to see failed removals and to work with people who are extremely upset and extremely distressed. (Ms Rogers) Some of them might be. I am suggesting that a proportion will be for reasons that they do not feel they have finished up their affairs or they have not had adequate opportunity to discuss finally with their representatives; and we do have examples where people are being put on planes or it is suggested they are about to be put on a plane when they still have outstanding appeals, etc, to go through. It is not always the case that people are simply resisting removal for the sake of resisting removal; they may have very genuine reasons. I am suggesting a system that takes that into account and tries to deal with that. (Ms Rogers) I would hope that the people who risk life coming in the manner that they do, under trains or whatever, to the UK are recognised for whatever protection they need. But if they do not have protection needs, I am suggesting that there are ways of seeking their cooperation. Mr Prosser: Thank you. Miss Widdecombe (Ms Rogers) I would hope that our members do inform people when it is the end of the road. However, events change and things do happen at the last minute. In fact, as I said, there is evidence of removals being attempted against people for whom it is not the end of the road, and it is quite right that they should be able to consult their representatives as they are being put on the plane unlawfully. However, I am suggesting that the system - and that includes the Immigration Service and the people at the Home Office - help people to prepare for their removal as well as their representatives, and help people to reconcile themselves to that. We are all aware that in the past removals have taken months, years sometimes, to be effected. It is very difficult for a representative to say, "I think you should pack your bags because the Immigration Service could be here any minute" and one year later the Immigration Service still are not there. In that circumstance, what are representatives supposed to do? That is a lack of clarity by the Immigration Service. (Ms Rogers) They may wish the assistance of the authorities to be removed. But, in any event, it requires everyone to have transparent systems, to have systems that are easy to understand and attempt to reconcile people to their situation. I am not suggesting there are easy answers. Miss Widdecombe: I think we have probably done that one to death. Shall I move on? Chairman: Detention. Yes, please. Miss Widdecombe (Mrs Tarshish) Excuse me? Nobody ...? (Mrs Tarshish) You mean he is fed, watered ... Yes, he is fed and watered there. (Mrs Tarshish) Well, I would say that he is provided with a bed, yes. (Mrs Tarshish) Well, that is your limited ---- Miss Widdecombe: Yes. The point I put to you was that he was not sitting round with a begging bowl, which is the picture that you presented - I did not present, you presented earlier - of what is happening. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) I was talking about something slightly different. Chairman: Yes, people who were still at liberty in the community but whose claim had run out. Miss Widdecombe (Mrs Tarshish) I think that is rather twisting things and I cannot really agree with what you are saying, but, anyway .... (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, we do. We actually submitted to the Home Office, to the Detention Users Group, a table of comparisons between each of the removal centres: those that are purpose-built and those that have been acquired into the establishment from the previous prison sector. There are differences and we have a very good table of how they vary. The level and standard of delivery of service is different from one place to another, particularly between the purpose-built ones that are run by Wackenhut, Group 4, etc. One of the great differences is that the regimes in the purpose-built ones, Tinsley House, Harmondsworth, etc, have, for example, longer visiting hours. They have seven hours but the previous prison establishments, like Lindholme and Dungavel, have two hours a day for visiting, and all these places tend to be way out of an accessible public transport system, so it is really difficult for family and friends to visit people, particularly because of the limited hours in the prisons. But this table goes across the border, looking at any number of issues. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. Basically in the purpose-built establishments like Harmondsworth, Campsfield, Tinsley House, there are activity programmes, there are gyms, educational classes. They do vary enormously between one establishment and the other. Even places like Haslar have a very good educational service there for the detainees, but it does vary enormously and that is somewhat disturbing. For example, children's activities: there are three establishments that have family units where children are detained with their families. Dungavel, Tinsley House and Harmondsworth have family units but they are really quite small, and you have to remember that in some of these detention centres/removal centres, like Dungavel, families are staying in detention for over 100 days - one family for 190 days. What are you going to do with small children in an enclosed area? I have seen some of them for myself. They are very small. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) They are very small. Miss Widdecombe (Mrs Tarshish) Again, these all vary enormously. Some places try to put in place a reasonable service; others do not. For example, one of the big problems in detention centres is depression, mental health. If you imagine you are being closed in and locked up for many hours every day, if you are in the prison regime. If you are in a detention centre, you are free to move around ---- (Mrs Tarshish) They are in fairly small areas. For example, Campsfield House is not a large place. You have a facility for about 184 or 185 men, mostly between the ages of 25/30/35, something like that, which is a lot of men in a small geographical area to be all together. If you have been to Campsfield House, it is an incredibly oppressive place. The ceilings are very low and you really feel it, you feel locked up, and you are locked up - not in the sense of a prison where you are locked up in your cell, you are free to move from one area to another, but you are behind a fence, it is a secure fence, and you are not free or permitted to come and go as you please - that you are not allowed to do. You are locked up in that sense, not in the sense of a prison. If you go to somewhere like Haslar, the circumstances there are appalling: men in dormitories, sleeping head to toe. It is despicable. The other one is Dover, where you have about eight people in six-bedded rooms - that is six people sleeping together. It is unacceptable. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, we do. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, we have a table here that has monitored that in detail. Miss Widdecombe: I am sure we will be able to have a copy of that. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, we certainly will. Miss Widdecombe (Mrs Tarshish) They are all here and I can submit each of them in writing. They will be fully detailed. (Ms Rogers) I think the only criteria are those which are in compliance with Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights which states that detention in these circumstances, immigration circumstances, should only be where necessary in order to stop someone from illegally entering or in order to effect their removal. In my submission, a detention is therefore only justified where it is strictly necessary, and that is where other alternatives have been considered and dispelled as not suitable or not appropriate and where the length of detention remains within the law. A detention can become unlawful simply by its length. For example, if someone is subject to removal or it is said they are going to be removed, but it just goes on and on and on, then the detention becomes unlawful. (Ms Rogers) I cannot give you a list, if that is what you are looking for. (Ms Rogers) Where, for instance, it is deemed to be necessary because the person is about to be removed and, if they are not detained, they will abscond, and where alternatives have been looked at. So the Immigration Service have looked at, for instance, reporting conditions - and they could be on daily reporting conditions - and have dispelled that and discounted that as a viable alternative because the person has a history, for instance, of abscontion. It is in those kind of very, very limited circumstances that I would suggest it. (Ms Rogers) No, I think a person can only be detained in these circumstances: if it is pending removal or to stop them from making an illegal entry. If neither of those criteria are met, then detention becomes unlawful. (Ms Rogers) No. (Ms Rogers) In my submission, they do not. There are cases where a people are being detained for very long periods of time. Indeed, Sally gave the example of children, families being detained for long periods of time and, in my submission, those detentions become unlawful just by their sheer length of time. (Ms Rogers) Yes, I think there are people who are being detained where again it is unlawful because they are not suitable for detention. They are unfit for detention, for instance. (Ms Rogers) Mentally unfit, physically unfit. (Mrs Tarshish) Probably not. (Ms Rogers) Probably not. They may or may not be, but the question was about detention. (Ms Rogers) It may be more appropriate that they are given appropriate medical treatment rather than being detained in a detention facility. (Ms Rogers) At the end of the process. (Ms Rogers) From my perception of the people currently in detention, they are in there at all stages. They are in there from the beginning of this stage - and I believe Sally gave some statistic on the number who are detained from entry in the UK - and there are some in the middle of the process and some at the end. (Ms Rogers) I do not have that statistic. (Mrs Tarshish) We do have some statistics that we have collected, so we could supply that. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, but I would like to qualify this: these are figures collected from two detention centres and the population was those whom we visited. You have: "When were they detained" ( that is, at what process along the line): on arrival, 17 per cent; on reporting, 9 per cent; from a Home Office interview, 2 per cent; from police and prison custody, 7 per cent; picked up by immigration either at place of work or home, 31 per cent; and a staggering 35 per cent not known - and I do not quite know what that means. (Mrs Tarshish) And only from the population we visit. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. (Ms Rogers) The change in name to removal centres was supposed to reflect that people were being detained at the end of the process. If you look at Oakington, they are the beginning and the end of the process, if you like, but Oakington is a different category because they are detained on different criteria. (Ms Rogers) My answer is: Why do we need to lock the doors? (Ms Rogers) If people are given conditions of their stay (for instance, they must live at a certain address or a certain facility, that they must report at certain times of the week or month) you know where they are. I do not see why a person's fundamental right to be at liberty - and that is a fundamental right - needs to be interfered with in these circumstances. Secondly, whilst in an ideal world all this could happen very quickly, we all know that ideal worlds do not exist and we all know that bureaucracy is such that at a certain point in time things will slow down, that people will be detained for longer periods. There are people who are in detention at the moment who are in detention for a longer period. We know where those people are and for some reason the system is not serving them very efficiently or very fast. To deny a person their fundamental right for liberty on the excuse of administrative convenience is in my view unlawful and unjustified. (Mrs Tarshish) There are lots of other ways of making sure that people do not abscond. For most of them, it is in their interests, I think, when they are on bail, that they do report. (Mrs Tarshish) I do not have those statistics, so I do not know what numbers we are talking about. The other point is that there are lots of other programmes that could be looked at. There is the appearance assistance programme in the USA. You do not have to keep all of them in one secure place. Miss Widdecombe: Thank you, Chairman. Chairman (Ms Rogers) May I return to a very small point that miss Widdecombe raised about needs in detention. Whilst detainees' needs in terms of food and water might be met, their needs as human beings are not necessarily being met. If you look at the situation, for instance, of children being detained, it is quite a fallacy to suggest that their needs are being met as children. In that respect, I think children should always be treated first as children and second as detainees or asylum seekers. I am thinking, for instance, of their educational needs. In fact, within a detention facility it is very difficult - and I am not criticising the providers - to provide education when you have one facility, perhaps one teacher, children of different English speaking abilities, different education backgrounds, a variety of ages from two up to 15 or 16 It is actually very difficult to meet their needs as children. Miss Widdecombe (Ms Rogers) Yes, I think they could. (Mrs Tarshish) Absolutely. Miss Widdecombe: At 16 they ----- Chairman: Miss Widdecombe, if you want to give evidence, we will call you as a witness! Mr Winnick. David Winnick (Ms Rogers) We talked before about the efficiency of the system. I think to a large extent the public fears, as it were, could be allayed by some kind of knowledge and confidence in a system that is efficient. You do not need to detain people in order to make the public feel the system is efficient. In fact, the public might not, when those detention centres are in their back yard think that in fact detention is such a good idea after all. In my view, we are simply pandering to uninformed opinion by suggesting that detention is the answer. (Ms Rogers) I hope that accusation is not levied at me personally. (Ms Rogers) Our organisation, as I said, are regulated by professional bodies. If people have complaints about the way in which they are regulated, then perhaps they would draw them to the attention of the regulating authorities. The fact is that as a barrister I have duties to the court: I would get a wasted costs order for bringing a case that was not arguable or for simply stringing out things unnecessarily where there was no legal basis for the challenge. Lawyers who are professional will only make challenges where they are sustainable and it is for the courts to determine whether they are sustainable. Indeed, I am quite sure we would be disciplined if we were bringing claims that were wholly unsustainable. (Ms Rogers) Yes. (Ms Rogers) I do not accept that claim is justified for reasons I have set out: if it is the case that lawyers are bringing claims that are wholly unjustified, unmeritorious and simply stringing it out, they would be flung out of court within minutes, and probably with a wasted costs order. We cannot do that as professionals. Indeed, if there is a suggestion that we were doing it, undoubtedly we would be disciplined. Furthermore, we would not get public funding to do that. We have to satisfy a merits test in order to get public funding for cases and a barrister will have to give an opinion as to the merits of the claim. If we deem it less than meritorious, the case will not be publicly funded, so stringing out will not be an option. (Ms Rogers) I am suggesting that it does not happen ..... (Ms Rogers) Well, I have no evidence of it happening. David Winnick: I see. So be it. Thank you. Chairman (Ms Rogers) I think particularly if you look at the back end, the 23 per cent who are in detention for very long periods of time, in my experience that normally reflects the fact that they are probably non-returnable, so there may be a problem with returning them to the country when they are still in detention. There are also people who are, unfortunately, in the system forgotten. An inquiry to the Minister will undoubtedly reveal that there are occasions where simply the case has been overlooked within the asylum determining unit and somehow they have been missed out. There are, unfortunately, a large number of longer term detainees who are not represented and some reason have found it hard to get representation. That can also add to delays. (Ms Rogers) They may not have been able to access their representation in the first place. Unfortunately, we have come across cases where people have been very badly represented or once they have gone into detention their representation has forgotten about them. I am not talking about regulated members of the profession, necessarily; unfortunately, we all accept there are people outside that who take detainees and others, very vulnerable people, for a ride. There may be a variety of reasons why people are in detention for a very long period but in my view those have to be reviewed because they are not lawful detentions. (Mrs Tarshish) We do have some Home Office statistics about this. In the last quarter of 2002 there were 45 detainees that had been held under detention for more than a year, 40 of them were asylum seekers. Out of that number, we know, but there may be more, at least one of them has been for more than three years in detention. (Mrs Tarshish) I do not know the specifics of the case but it is something that does need to be looked at into thoroughly. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, some one year, two years, two or three of them. (Mrs Tarshish) I will just look this up for you. (Pause) One is partly to do with the fact that he has no understanding of the system and no one has bothered to explain it to him. He has no English and there is no one to translate for him. This is a real problem, throughout the detention estate, the problem of translators, particularly for people who speak a language that may be a very unusual one. This is a genuine difficulty and they find themselves shunted from pillar to post and sometimes, sadly, there is not access to legal help, which goes back to our point about the independent welfare provision, to ensure that these people are properly represented, to ensure that they can access the legal services to which they are actually entitled. Chairman: Okay. Thank you for that. Mr Prosser (Mrs Tarshish) I was asked not to reveal this to you. (Mrs Tarshish) If you want some more detail, I will ask permission. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) It can be provided but I was asked not to do this on this occasion. (Mrs Tarshish) Okay. Mr Prosser: We respect that. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) I cannot comment. (Ms Rogers) I cannot comment on that, I am afraid. (Ms Rogers) I do not know of those cases, so I do not know why they did not report. I have known of cases myself, in which I have been involved, where there are misunderstandings between various arms about where a person is to be reporting, at what time and to whom. It may be that reporting restrictions have been changed and Eaton House is not aware of it. I know even cases from Eaton House ----- (Ms Rogers) My evidence is not to suggest that every single asylum seeker is an angel or every single illegal immigrant is an angel. I do not seek to suggest that. I am seeking practical ways in which to effect removals. That was my evidence. Chairman: We have a common objective there. Mrs Dean. Mrs Dean (Ms Rogers) They can still apply for it if they know they can apply for it. One of the problems within detention facilities is, as Sally has touched upon, the lack of interpreters there. People who do not have representatives may not actually be aware of their right to make a bail application unless it is automatic. That is how people remain in detention for very long periods of time without any judicial oversight. The danger is the lack of judicial oversight. In fact, it is not simply that that part is not being implemented; it has now been repealed as a result of the 2002 Act. (Ms Rogers) The detention criteria are such that a person who is unfit for detention (in terms of psychological or physical reason) are not supposed to be detained. Pregnant women, for instance, are supposed to be detained only in exceptional circumstances. Children are supposed to be detained only in exceptional circumstances. Unfortunately, the evidence bears out that those groups are being detained. One of the problems, for instance, with unfitness for detention, is the assessment of that or, indeed, the lack of assessment of that. As regards children, we have had evidence today about children being detained for very long periods, well in excess of the exceptional category, and, indeed, last year there was a report by BID (Bail for Immigration Detainees) of pregnant women being detained. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. One of the cases that came to our attention was that of a woman of two small children aged six years old and, I think, 18 months. She was detained for 111 days, finally got bail and was released, and it took six months for the six-year old child to regain the weight she had lost while in detention. These are strikingly tragic examples. (Mrs Tarshish) Six years old and lost a great deal of weight - I do not know the exact figure but it was a significant number of kilograms - and it took six months after they had been released on bail to regain that weight. One of the things I would really strongly recommend that this panel take away with them is that this facility for detaining families is very recent. Before, there was only one place, Tinsley House, and it was usually for very short periods of time. Now we are getting these very long periods at Dungavel and I think there should be some overall monitoring as to the effects on children, and probably the best placed government organisation to do that would be Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Prisons. We have no idea at the moment what the effect, short term or long term, will be on these children. We are one of the few countries I know of - I cannot think of another one off the top of my head - that detains families. (Mrs Tarshish) I think it probably goes back to the same administration problems of documentation. I do not know, I am not privy to this. Remember, we are an organisation that visits. Sometimes people tell us, sometimes they do not. I am just reporting to you the effect of this on people. (Ms Rogers) I think people need to have routine access to legal advice. If you are detained in a prison establishment or if you are detained pending charge, for instance, you have access to a duty solicitor and routine legal advice. The problem in immigration detention is there is no such routine access, and, whilst the two organisations which give legal advice, the Immigration Advisory Service and the Refugee Legal Centre, quite often within detention centres have a telephone that can be rung, those organisations are extremely stretched and cannot often take on cases. (Ms Rogers) No. I am sure AVID have better information on this but my experience is that they do not. Sometimes they were operating such advice, but as a matter of routine it is not the case now. (Ms Rogers) I think that reflects their lack of resources, their lack of ability to take on a case. It is very disheartening as a representative to go into a detention centre and say, "These are your rights but, I am sorry, we do not have the facility to help you, so bye-bye." I think that may reflect the fact that these organisations are very overstretched and cannot take on more work, so they do not hold those surgeries. (Mrs Tarshish) I read recently that there is a proposal for a duty scheme by the Legal Services Commission. That would be a very positive step. But I think we have to bear in mind that some of these removal centres are very far away now from the south-east of England where there is a concentration of good practising legal representation. This is not the case in other areas of the country where the removal centres are, so there is just a dearth of people who could actually even provide this service. That automatically excludes people from accessing the service that would help removal, would help resolve this situation. (Ms Rogers) Certainly our members' experience is that representation of a detained case involves much more work than for someone who is on the outside, because of setting up meetings. If you are based in London and your detainee is, first, for instance, at Harmondsworth (which is quite convenient to visit, which makes it quite easy to facilitate legal representation) but then is moved to Haslar or, worse still, to Dungavel, representation actually becomes very difficult and very difficult to achieve on an LSE contract. (Ms Rogers) All immigration detention is indefinite, in the sense that, unless they have removal directions and removal directions are said, we do not know how long the detention is going to be. There is a certain group of people, those detained under the anti-terrorism legislation, who are indefinitely detained. Chairman (Ms Rogers) It is, yes. (Ms Rogers) Yes. One of the problems with immigration detention - and I think this is where it contrasts so much to people detained in prison facilities as convicted criminals - is the indeterminacy of detention: how long it is going to go on for.
Mrs Dean (Ms Rogers) Automatic bail would help to alleviate that. (Ms Rogers) In terms of time? (Ms Rogers) That is very, very difficult to say. It depends on the individual circumstances. (Mrs Tarshish) There are instances where you could have an alternative to a situation where it could not be resolved legally very quickly. For people who are, for example, serving long times in indefinite detention, you could give them temporary admission and put a restriction on their movements or reporting restrictions. There are alternatives. You do not have to keep somebody in indefinite detention. They have not committed a crime. I think we often lose track of the fact that it is not a crime. They have no beginning, middle or end to this: for some of these people in long-term detention it must be harrowing never to know when you will be released and how. It cannot be effective taking up a space like that. I think it is inefficient. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. (Mrs Tarshish) But, as I said, there are alternatives to taking up long-term spaces. I just think it is not an efficient use. (Mrs Tarshish) Unless we try it, we would not know. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, but they also do try it and it does work. I do not know which statistics we are looking at. (Mrs Tarshish) No, I know that. I am aware of that. (Mrs Tarshish) According to Home Office statistics, we are looking at a small group of people. According to last September, it was 45 people. It would be useful to know exactly what their situation is. (Mrs Tarshish) The Home Office statistics give us that in the quarter ending September 28, more than a year, 45 people. It is a small group of people. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes. Chairman: Mrs Dean, sorry to interrupt you. Mrs Dean (Mrs Tarshish) I think we have covered that with the documentation. Sometimes it is availability of tickets, flights, spaces on flights. (Mrs Tarshish) I see no point in keeping people in long-term and indefinite detention. I think it is cruel. (Ms Rogers) In my organisation, for a person who is not returnable for whatever reason, their detention becomes unlawful. (Ms Rogers) If they have representatives and if they make the appropriate applications, I believe a court would find that it would be a violation, if anything, of the right to liberty not to release them in those circumstances. (Ms Rogers) I do not know, because I do not have statistics on the number of people who are in detention but are non-removable. As I have said, sadly far too many people are not represented. You would have to ask the Home Office that. (Mrs Tarshish) I would like to point out, for fear of talking at cross-purposes, that we are not referring to people who are on deportation orders. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) Exactly. (Mrs Tarshish) That is right, so we do not know how many people in these figures are actually on deportation orders, which would change the whole complexion of who could be released and who could not. Representing my membership, I would wish that to be recorded very clearly, the distinction between the two points. Mrs Dean: Thank you for that. That is all, Chairman. Chairman: Thank you. Mr Prosser Mr Prosser (Mrs Tarshish) First of all, let me describe to you the sort of thing that would happen. We do not automatically get the names of those who want to be visited. We cannot phone up and say to the detention centre, "Please could you give us a list of the people who are there. We would like to contact each one individually"; we wait for them to contact us. The other way round, I believe, if I understand correctly, would be a breach of duty of care: you cannot reveal names to the general public. After that, it varies enormously from area to area. Places like Oxford and Campsfield House have a long established procedure of visiting, whereby names are passed between detainees, and a person would then ring up and book an afternoon or an evening session to go and visit a person. In terms of creating a trusting relationship, that has taken time. Prior to what is happening in the last few weeks, there was time to build up a relationship because the length of detention was sometimes extremely long. At the moment in Campsfield House it is becoming a system of transferring detainees, not to be removed but to other detention centres, so that the ability for the person to make a relationship is reduced enormously now because it takes time. When you meet them for the first time, they do not know who you are, and you have to build up this relationship. In other places, sometimes, the old prison regime makes it very difficult indeed, with visiting orders, and even just getting names of those you could go and visit. This is part of the inequalities in the estate that really do need to be looked at. People are entitled to be visited, even under the Human Rights Act they are entitled to be visited, and your own rules say that they should have access to social visiting. The role of the chaplain could be increased, to draw in from the outside. I hope that you will also be looking at the role of the chaplain in detention centres. (Mrs Tarshish) We offer training for our visitors. It is not compulsory, they can decide to do it or not, but most of them benefit from the long-term experience of visitors. Also we ask people from immigration, lawyers, other NGO organisations, to come to talk, so that visitors actually gain a wide approach and hopefully an accurate picture of both sides, of what the Immigration Service is trying to do and what their legal and professional obligations are. This helps visitors enormously, to try to have a balanced approach and a confident and almost semi-professional approach to this, so they are not speaking and acting in ignorance. (Mrs Tarshish) I think in some detention centres formerly that did happen. It is highly regrettable that that is not the case now and that it is becoming more and more restrictive. On the other hand, if you are moving people in and out very fast, that is going to be difficult. But there are things that could be improved. One of the great problems is food. You have so many different nationalities with different requirements, maybe religious or just differences in the type of food prepared. In the old days, prisoners made their own food, but that has long gone and I think it is regrettable. (Mrs Tarshish) I cannot give you ... As I said earlier on, it may be the tip of an iceberg. Until we have a system where there is an external overall monitoring of this system of departure, either from the home or from the detention centre, right to the aeroplane itself, we will not know. We have masses of evidence here about injury sustained during removal; about people being deprived of time to collect even the basic things regardless of whether they knew - because a lot of these removals take place quite unpredictably, at weekends, early in the morning, and people have not had a chance together their thoughts together - but the one thing that to us seems missing is the external scrutiny. If there are problems, which evidence does indicate, then it is something which should be very seriously looked at. If people are being injured, whether it is the detainee himself or the escorts themselves, I think that is sufficient evidence to say the system is not working and it needs to be looked at. (Mrs Tarshish) I argue about the point of sustained complaints because if you are about to be removed it is very difficult to keep it going from thousands or hundreds of miles away. I actually think that is not a valid point. The point that would make these things valid, one way or the other, is if there were an external body organising and helping to monitor. If you have a very agitated person and he is surrounded by representatives of organisations that are trying to get rid of him, but there is one person there who is outside of that, that has a very sobering effect. I think it is something we have to take seriously. Chairman (Mrs Tarshish) I would not like to ask our membership, but I can certainly put the proposal to them if you are prepared to foot the bill. It may not be appropriate for a visitor to confuse the roles. There are other organisations I think that would probably take on that role. But it should be investigated. Mr Prosser (Mrs Tarshish) We do have some really quite traumatic instances. One instance involved a man who had split up with his girlfriend. They had an 18 month old child who was with a childminder during the day. The man was picked up for removal and of course there was insufficient time to make proper arrangements for the child in the care of the childminder. It is ghastly. (Mrs Tarshish) Again, these are all questions I cannot answer. They are anecdotal to me and our organisation but again they could be the tip of the iceberg Unless there is proper external scrutiny, I do not think any of us can give an accurate reply. (Mrs Tarshish) Yes, I have heard of this. There have been removals when the solicitor has not been able to be contacted. (Ms Rogers) It is certainly the case that removal and detention prior to removal often happens at weekends, out of hours, when representatives are not available, and, unfortunately, the consequence of that is that people may be removed unlawfully, when they should not be removed. If I could turn back very briefly to point about injuries being sustained, one of the points that came quite clearly from the evidence given last week by Wackenhut is that they do not go to houses and detain people, that is the Immigration Service. There is quite a bit of splitting up along the road about whose role these things are. If it is the Immigration Service that is subsequently directing Wackenhut, it is not surprising that the Immigration Service are not necessarily going to concern themselves that much with the manner in which it is done, when they themselves are known to conduct removals from homes, for instance, in a manner that is inhumane. So they may not necessarily have been scrutinising Wackenhut, and that is why, Sally is absolutely right, there needs to be some kind of external monitoring of this, of everyone in the system - and that is Immigration Service and Wackenhut or whichever private contractor. It has been a long concern of my organisation that private contractors are involved in this kind of process because of the fact that they are not necessarily accountably. One of the concerns is that we rarely know on what terms they are contracted to provide the services that they provide. It is very important that there is scrutiny because, as Sally said, once a person is put on a plane and they are successfully removed, the chances of them following up a complaint against Wackenhut or against Immigration Service is nil. It would be pie in the sky to suggest that they were going to be able to do that. (Mrs Tarshish) Our visiting finishes once they are in the process of removal. We do not have any further access to that person, so these are stories that come back in all sorts of other ways. (Mrs Tarshish) No, we try to keep them. We are trying to monitor them as best we can. We keep going back to external scrutiny. That is the only way, I think, you can have an adequate and truthful picture of what is happening - and it should be pursued. Also, if a detainee is injured, he should be allowed to enter the process of assault, like any other person who is injured. If it is grievous bodily harm, actual bodily harm, he has a course which is available to him. It should be made available and he should not be removed until that case is properly dealt with. (Ms Rogers) Unfortunately, although as lawyers we can encourage our clients to take legal action against people who assault them, you can understand why asylum seekers and others are very reticent about taking legal action against people whom they consider might have an influence on the ultimate outcome of their case. They may be very reluctant to take that kind of legal action. That is the problem with legal avenues. It is understandable, if you think that might have a negative impact on whether or not you will be allowed to remain in the country, that you may not be rushing to take a lawsuit out against the officer who arrested you. (Ms Rogers) Yes. Mr Prosser: Thank you. Chairman: Mr Russell. Bob Russell (Ms Rogers) It would be purely anecdotal. Some people do maintain contact with their representatives, particularly if they have family members here or other reasons for doing so. Others, unfortunately, our members do not hear from ever again and it is quite difficult to know what happens to people once they are returned. I was interested to read the evidence of those who do the escorting, because they suggest that in some countries there is interest in the people on return; in other countries it looks like they walk out the door but the problem is there is very little monitoring of what happens beyond that door. Of course the escort service's duties end at the point of handing them over. Sometimes UNHCR involves itself in monitoring what happens to failed asylum seekers or certainly has evidence about that and they will feed that information back. That has led in the past, for instance, in the case of Sri Lanka, for policy reflecting the fact that failed asylum seekers, certain categories of failed asylum seekers, were at risk. (Ms Rogers) Chechnya, I am afraid, I do not know about. Chairman: I do not think we remove people to Chechnya. Bob Russell (Ms Rogers) If that is where they want to go, indeed, that would probably be good. It will mean that they have the ability to survive. What I am concerned about with people being removed -- although the evidence last week suggested they are given some pocket money; pocket money does not lead to any kind of sustainable life and probably returning to the home area would be better. (Mrs Tarshish) Sometimes this is where visitors actually can help, but it is very limited, in that there are connections in visitor groups with churches abroad and sometimes it has been known that we have been able to arrange for a member from a church in that particular country, where it is possible to do it, to have liaison to ensure that they are re-integrated back into their community without any of the sometimes traumatic consequences of their return being escorted. Some of them have to pay bribes to get through immigration back in their own country and there have been instances that we have got to know about where they have actually been imprisoned until they were able, or someone else was able, to pay their fare money back to the aircraft carriers. It is all very haphazard, what happens. What one should bear in mind is that if they are being returned to a country where there is neither a cessation clause or you do have in-country information where, for example, it might not be safe to return them, then it seems to me they should not be returned there anyway. But it does happen. (Ms Rogers) That is a problem. Because we do not document people, as it were, on departure there are undoubtedly people who do voluntarily leave and think "That is the end of the process, I am off now". However, you would have to ask the Home Office for how they monitor that. (Ms Rogers) I am certainly aware of cases where people have voluntarily left, particularly if they are aware of how forcible removal might take place, or if the circumstances in their country have changed. I have met numbers of people who would genuinely wish to return to their country should the circumstances change. (Ms Rogers) A voluntary returns programme, in my view, only works if it is truly voluntary and it is not on pain of further detention - for instance if a person is told "If you do not enter into this programme voluntarily, we will detain you longer". It can never be used as a stick like that. However, it can work, if it is truly voluntary, to help people have a financial package, for instance, to assist them re-establish themselves in their own country. I was very interested to hear from colleagues in Finland about their attitude to asylum seekers and others. Very much part of the Finnish programme is to encourage - almost induce - people into education whilst they are waiting for their decisions and into jobs, so that they return to their countries of origin if they are ultimately not successful with skills, with education and better able to cope for themselves long-term. (Ms Rogers) AVID would probably be better able to explain this to you, but I understand that people in removal centres are not given that opportunity to gain access to voluntary assistance programmes. (Ms Rogers) It simply has to be voluntary. That is the point. If it was truly voluntary then I do not think that our members would have any objection to there being a programme for them to return and then to be given assistance to return, but it must be truly voluntary. The experience of my members is that people who are in long-term detention can become so demoralised because they cannot see an end to their detention, that they volunteer to depart, and that is not quite the same as a truly voluntary departure. Chairman (Ms Rogers) Thank you. Chairman: Thank you. The session is closed. |