On 9/10/14, the Independent Family Returns Panel published their Annual Report for 2012-14 - download this here. The panel advises the Home Office on the immigration detention of children and forcible removal of families from the UK.
Sarah Campbell, Research and Policy Manager at Bail for Immigration Detainees, commented:
‘The Home Office appears to have initiated enforcement action against very many families unnecessarily. In the cases of 242 out of 649 families in the returns process, the Home Office did not in the end pursue the family’s removal.
‘We welcome a number of the panel’s recommendations, such as their call for the Home Office to provide anti-malarial protection to children before forcibly removing them from the UK. However, we urge the panel to reconsider their position on child detention and use of force against children.
‘We find it extraordinary that the panel is recommending that more children should be detained(1) given the overwhelming evidence of the harm suffered by detained children.(2)
‘We are appalled that the panel is encouraging the Home Office to use physical force against children to facilitate their removal from the UK. In 2012, the Prisons Inspectorate produced a disturbing report citing concerns about the use of force at the Cedars family detention facility.(3) The Home Office has since recognised that its failure to provide adequate safeguards for children was unlawful, and ceased using force to remove children from the UK.(4)
‘It is worrying that the panel previously failed to pick up on clear concerns about the use of force against children. It is still more troubling that the panel is now recommending that the Home Office recommence using force against children.’
Notes
(1) For example, at p10 of their Annual Report, the panel outline their opposition to Barnardo’s red line that no more than 10% of families returned every year should be detained.
(2) See for example Lorek, A. Entholt, K. et al. (2009) “The mental and physical health difficulties of children held within a British immigration detention center: A Pilot Study” Child Abuse and Neglect Vol. 33 Issue 9, pp573-585; Children’s Commissioner for England (2010) Follow up report to: The arrest and detention of children who are subject to immigration control
(3) HM Chief Inspector of Prisons (2012) Report on an announced inspection of Cedars Pre-Departure Accommodation 30 April – 25 May 2012
(4) See R (on the application of Yiyu Chen and Ors) v Secretary of State for the Home Department CO/1119/2013. Shortly before a court hearing in this case, the Home Office re-published an old policy prohibiting the use of force against children and pregnant women save where absolutely necessary to prevent harm.
