‘Your case has been dismissed, today you're being detained,’ she said ... I started screaming ‘please, I don't want to go’. My mum too was screaming ... Two days later we were taken to Yarl’s Wood [removal centre in Bedfordshire]. That's the worst place in my life. I lost hope that we were going to go back to Glasgow. There was no more happiness in my life. I never stopped praying.’
That’s Precious, aged 10, who has been detained twice now. Her crime? Wanting to remain in the country where she has lived since she was three.
Every year, approximately 1300 children like Precious are locked up with their families, most of them in the privately run Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre in Bedfordshire. There is no time limit to their imprisonment, and although the average length of stay is 15 days, many families are detained for much longer periods of time.
Numerous reports have documented the detrimental impact detention has on children. One of them is The Royal Colleges of Paediatrics and Child Health, General Practitioners and Psychiatrists and the UK Faculty of Health’s report, ‘Significant Harm’. This report documents that almost all detained children suffer injury to their mental and physical health as a result of their detention. The effects include insomnia, weight loss, emotional and psychological regression, posttraumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and suicidal behaviour, amongst others. Yet despite this clear evidence, detention of children continues.
Whilst the new coalition government has pledged to end the detention of children, it has presently only committed to a “review” of the current system. Whereas the pledge is certainly welcomed as a positive step in the direction towards a more humane immigration system in the UK, the review is entirely inadequate and unnecessary. It is feared that while this review takes place, many other children will be arrested and suffer mental injuries as a result of their detention.
Alternatives to detention must avoid the emotional, physical and psychological trauma detention causes. They must therefore be premised on allowing people to remain in their communities. Asylum-seeking children and families, like all people, are embedded in social networks upon which they rely. It is from these communities that families can receive the support they need to navigate the asylum system. It is from the experiences of asylum seekers that communities can learn about the worlds we share. Alternatives must focus on maintaining and enhancing these bonds.
SOAS Detainee Support sees the government's pledge as an opportunity for a rational debate about alternatives to immigration detention that prioritise the welfare of migrants, asylum-seekers and their children above the restrictive tendencies of Home Office initiatives.
Therefore, on the 5th of June 2010, SOAS Detainee Support will host 'Release Carnival' – a march from Torrington Square to 10 Downing Street to demonstrate against the continued detention of children and families. We call for immediate release of all currently held families and for alternatives which put the interest of the child before everything else!
The day starts at 12pm in Torrington Square (near Russell Square) with speakers from Refugee and Migrant Justice, The Outcry Campaign, The Helen Bamber Foundation, MP Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem Dave Ravel, Clare Sambrook from End Child Detention Now, No One Is Illegal and Citizens for Sanctuary as well as ex-detainees. At 2pm we will march along side jugglers, samba music, clowns, dancers and theatre performances to Downing Street, where a delegation will deliver a letter and an alternative petition in number 10.
Join us!
For more information, go to releasecarnival.wordpress.com
or  http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=101311146578927&ref=ts
“I call on every single person who hears of what’s going on with the detention of asylum-seeking children to write, petition and demonstrate against it. My suspicions are that the motive behind such inhuman treatment are crude electoral ones, in which this government is allowing itself to be driven by anti-asylum-seeking press barons and the British National Party. Make no mistake about it, the UK has obligations towards asylum seekers and it has obligations towards children. At present, it looks very much as if we’re reneging on those obligations. This is to their great shame and we must do all we can to break the legislation, custom and practice that is allowing them to carry on in this way.” Michael Rosen, former Children’s Laureate.