Annual review of GPS tagging in the immigration system, 2023

Government doubles down on experimental surveillance tech to track migrants

‘Constantly on Edge’, the latest report on GPS tagging in immigration bail, has found that the Home Office has increased its use by 56% in the last year and is now using newer, experimental mobile fingerprint scanners to monitor migrants on bail, without effective safeguards in place.

Users of the new ‘non-fitted’ scanner devices – supplied to the Ministry of Justice by Buddi under a £6 million contract – described the experience as a “type of torture” and spoke of feeling “constantly on edge”.

The research comes a year after Public Law Project, Bail for Immigration Detainees, and Medical Justice published ‘Every move you make’ which revealed the ‘psychological torture’ caused by fitted GPS tracking devices.

Interviewees told researchers that the newer, non-fitted devices vibrate up to 10 times a day at random intervals, sometimes into the evening. If users are unable to scan their finger within a window of ‘around a minute’, they are considered to be in breach of their electronic monitoring bail condition. That breach is then reviewed by the Home Office.

Researchers found that an automated system – the Electronic Monitoring Review Tool (EMRT) – is used to decide which device type will be issued and for how long the person will be required to use it. Authors Dr Jo Hynes and Mia Leslie of the Public Law Project say there is not enough transparency around how the EMRT works to be sure that the process is free of bias.

The report found that reviews of decisions to impose GPS devices – a key safeguard in the process – are not being conducted in sufficient volumes.  As of July 2023, 622 quarterly reviews were overdue.

Author of the report Dr Jo Hynes said:

“These devices are utterly dehumanising. It is hard to imagine the vigilance required to be ready to scan your finger immediately at random times throughout the day, or risk  breaching your bail conditions. Our interviews with migrants show how oppressive this system is and the impact that constant watchfulness has on their daily lives and wellbeing.

“This level of surveillance is not only harmful, it is unnecessary. The rate of absconding from immigration bail is tiny. In 2021 it was 2.7% and in the first six months of 2022 it was 1.3%. Millions are being spent on a system to address a problem that is not evidenced, and which causes psychological harm to people already made very vulnerable by Home Office policies.

“With a pilot study having recently concluded, it seems likely that Government may look at rolling these devices out to people who arrive by ‘irregular’ means i.e. by small boat. Given what we know about the potential harm these devices can cause, such a move would be highly inappropriate.

“The systems around this surveillance regime are opaque and dysfunctional. There is limited transparency around the automated decision support tool used to decide which device type will be issued and for how long the person will be on it. In addition, in breach of its own guidelines, the Home Office has a significant backlog of reviews to complete, leaving many at risk.”

Testimony from people interviewed for ‘Constantly on edge’

Interviewees taking part in the research who have been required to use the non-fitted devices report feeling “constantly on edge” and “like a lower type of human”. Another described it as “a type of torture”.

“If you have to go to the bathroom or to use the toilet, everywhere that thing’s with you.” – Interviewee

“I felt like someone is always following me, behind me. It’s like, imagine you’re walking outside and someone is like walking behind you. Following you, like wherever you go that person is following you. You will start to panic. You shouldn’t be harming the person you are watching. That is really very bad, like I said, being watched is horrible.” – Interviewee

‘Constantly on edge’ was written with the support of Bail for Immigration Detainees (BID) and Medical Justice.

Pierre Makhlouf, Legal Director of BID, said:

“GPS tagging is a punitive measure that is unnecessary and generates fear of authority. Its use is disproportionate, entailing 24-hour surveillance and control of individuals, while being supported by policies that interfere with an individual’s right to privacy. Its use needs to be ended now.”

Emma Ginn, Director of Medical Justice said:

“Having already established that electronic monitoring carries a high risk of causing deterioration in existing poor mental health, Medical Justice is saddened that the Government has significantly increased its use. Reports of severe detrimental effects on mental health, including to the point of suicidal ideation, therefore come as no surprise.

“Many of our clients have experienced immense suffering before they reached the UK and are retraumatised by immigration detention here. Being tagged on release can impede their recovery.  Though they may have left detention, intense surveillance and control continues, with the associated risk of harm.”

Key findings:

• In 2023, there has been a 56% increase in the number of people GPS tagged as a condition of immigration bail.
• Non-fitted tagging devices were introduced from November 2022. These fingerprint scanner devices request periodic biometric verification from the user (vibrating at random times) and collect the person’s location data at all times.
• Between 1 January 2023 and 2 November 2023, 3,335 people have been subjected to fitted devices and 543 people subjected to non-fitted devices as a part of an electronic monitoring bail condition.
• Reviews of decisions to impose a GPS tag (a key safeguard) are not being conducted in sufficient volumes. As of July 2023, 622 quarterly reviews were overdue.
• An automated system – Electronic Monitoring Review Tool (EMRT) – is used as part of the process for deciding which device type people will be subject to, if they should be moved from a fitted to a non-fitted device, or if their monitoring is to be discontinued.
• The extent of the EMRT’s role in decision-making is opaque, making it difficult to assess the extent of automation bias in the decision-making process.
• The length of advised time people spend on devices is vast, ranging from 3-24 months on a fitted device to 18 months to indefinitely on a non-fitted device
• Buddi Limited was given £6 million to make these devices. The contract comes to an end on 30 December 2023.

Medical Justice today publishes ‘“If he dies, he dies”: What has changed since the Brook House Inquiry?’. This research, a comprehensive analysis of clinical evidence from 66 clients detained in Immigration Removal Centres (IRCs), visited by Medical Justice independent doctors between June 2022 and March 2023, demonstrates how unsafe and harmful immigration detention can be.

Undercover footage disclosed to the Brook House Inquiry revealed guards saying “if he dies, he dies” in 2017. The justification that this was part of the culture and a joke was found by the Inquiry to be “not only callous and unacceptable but betrays the extent of desensitisation to detained people’s health issues and vulnerabilities, and the dehumanisation of detained people by some staff”.

The experiences of the 66 people in this report shows that many of the same circumstances that were behind the mistreatment evidenced by the Brook House Inquiry, continue to exist across the UK’s IRCs.

The Brook House Inquiry provided a forensic analysis of how the abuse uncovered by Panorama in 2017 occurred. It found how the dangerous use of force, a wholesale failure of safeguards and a culture of dehumanisation led to 19 instances of inhuman or degrading treatment, breaching Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), within a 5-month period at Brook House IRC. It exposed failures, mistreatment and indifference at every level; from nurses and doctors, IRC staff, to Home Office civil servants. Light was shone on the structural deficiencies in detention safeguards and processes around use of force, segregation and responses to self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

Medical Justice has consistently evidenced the harm and dysfunctional safeguards to the Home Office. This report is the latest iteration of this work, which has stretched back over the past 18 years. All the failings documented in this report have taken place after the Inquiry’s public hearings, across the detention estate.

The Brook House Inquiry unequivocally places responsibility on the Home Office, urging action at the highest levels of government. There has been a failure to learn lessons from previous reviews; such a failure is described by the Inquiry’s Chair as a “dark thread” throughout her report. The Home Office publicly state their commitment to learning lessons to ensure that the mistreatment uncovered in Brook House never happens again. Yet, such abuse can only be avoided if there is meaningful change – which has been sorely lacking after previous investigations and reviews over the last two decades. The Inquiry made 33 recommendations which need to be urgently addressed.

The Home Office does not seem to acknowledge the severity of harm ongoing in detention and turns a blind eye to the failures over which it presides. They suggest that these are issues of the past. This ignores the important findings of the Inquiry that many of the factors which allow for mistreatment to occur, are unchanged to date. The Inquiry reached these conclusions after hearing evidence from current Home Office, custodial and healthcare staff and reviewing recent reports from His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP), the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration (ICIBI) and the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB), as well as from Medical Justice.

This Inquiry cannot be another one for the bookshelves. Our report demonstrates how many of the issues in the Inquiry are still ongoing today, across the detention estate. Action could not be more urgent as the government plans to significantly expand detention and implement the provisions of the Illegal Migration Act, knowing the harm that is still being caused. This ongoing harm is apparent from our evidence, , the death of Frank Ospina in March this year reportedly by suicide, and another recent death in November this year of an Albanian man following a reported attempted suicide, a ‘multiple mass suicide attempt’ and the continuing failures of the Home Office safeguards, including the identification of people at risk of self-harm or suicide.

Of the 66 clients, 52 had evidence of a history of torture, 29 had evidence of a history of trafficking and 25 had evidence of a history of both torture and trafficking. Detention had already caused the mental state of 64 clients to deteriorate and had caused harm to all 66 clients.

63 had a diagnosis of at least one mental health condition and 49 people were recorded as having self-harmed, suicidal thoughts and/or attempted suicide. Uses of force included during transfer to segregation, removal from suicide netting and transfer to hospital appointments.

Medical Justice was appointed a Core Participant (CP) due to its extensive experience of the clinical safeguarding failures and understanding of the inadequate healthcare provision in IRCs.  One of our greatest concerns is the government’s plans to increase detention, despite the ongoing abuse, raises fears it is ignoring BHI findings.

Research published by Bail for Immigration Detainees, Medical Justice and Public Law Project shows that migrants fitted with GPS tags experience significant psychological and physical suffering, despite no clear explanation or evidence from the Home Office that tagging is necessary or cost effective.

Over 2,000 people on immigration bail are currently made to wear the GPS tags 24 hours a day, indefinitely, with cases often taking years to close. The latest figures show only 1.3% of people released from immigration detention absconded in the first six months of 2022.

GPS tagging collects more intrusive data than other electronic tagging, and the Home Office is able to access an individual’s ‘trail’ data in a wide range of circumstances. This includes if they make an immigration application involving the right to a family life under Article 8 of the ECHR.

With first-hand testimony from migrants who have been tagged and clinicians who work with them, Every move you make: the human impact of GPS tagging in immigration bail finds that:

• Wearers of GPS tags experience anxiety, stress, discomfort, and pain.
• Many wearers said they had no idea how to challenge the decision to tag them or indeed how their data was being used by the Home Office.
• People have been tagged despite the Home Office being aware of poor mental health or psychiatric conditions and their previous experience of trauma.
• Tagged individuals have reported increased feelings of social stigmatisation, isolation and avoidance of public spaces and activities.
• Tags affect every aspect of people’s daily life and routine, including the ability to exercise, sleep, work, have relationships and care for their children.
• The tags are used alongside strict requirements to report to the Home Office on a regular basis.
• There are a range of practical problems with the tags themselves, including devices failing or chargers not working.

A new report from the Helen Bamber Foundation, Medical Justice, the Anti Trafficking and Labour Exploitation Unit and Focus on Labour Exploitation, highlights the government’s failure to protect victims of trafficking in immigration detention – and that it has deliberately put in place a system in which more trafficking victims will be locked up. The number held in immigration detention each year has tripled from 500 in 2017 to over 1600 last year. Even when identified as possible victims of trafficking, people are not being released and are detained while waiting for a final decision in their case, when the average time for making these decisions is a staggering 17 months.

The Home Office frequently claims that people ‘abuse’ the system by claiming to be trafficked to secure their release from detention. But over 90% of cases are confirmed to be genuine victims of trafficking. There is no evidence of a process being abused – rather, people who have already been exploited and mistreated are experiencing further abuse by an immigration system that is not fit for purpose.

This report makes practical recommendations for improving that system and calls for an urgent comprehensive review of the process for detaining confirmed or possible victims of trafficking.

Medical evidence emerges of the harm inflicted on those targeted by UK government for removal to Rwanda

Medical Justice today publishes “Who’s Paying The Price?: The Human Cost Of The Rwanda Scheme”, a comprehensive analysis of people targeted for removal to Rwanda which details medical evidence of the harm inflicted on them. The policy is damaging in general for anyone, acutely so for such vulnerable torture and trafficking survivors who are already paying a high human cost even before any flights have taken off to Rwanda.

The UK Government has entered a cruel and unconscionable agreement, which will forcibly remove people who have come to the UK seeking safety to Rwanda, with no return to the UK. It has been widely condemned by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, parliamentary committees, as well as the medical community. It is being judicially reviewed in the High Court, with hearings starting on Monday 5th September 2022, the day the new Prime Minister will be announced. Both Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss have promised more Rwanda-style deals.

The first removal flight to Rwanda was halted. Yet the health and wellbeing of those targeted has already been severely impacted.

“Our clinicians have described the severe impact of the threat of removal to Rwanda on mental health: Experiences of intense fear, anxiety about the future, profound loss of hope, and traumatic reminders of past experiences of powerlessness deprive people of the sense of safety required for careful assessment and recovery. These experiences would be harmful in general, but are made even more acute by their being experienced within immigration detention and by a population with a high rate of vulnerability. 

Our report shows extremely high rates of evidence of torture, trafficking and other vulnerabilities in this group, to whom the government plan to deny assessment or interview before they are forcibly removed. The policy knowingly places people in an extremely damaging situation and should be considered exceptionally harmful. 

As a doctor, what shocks me most is the total disregard for the need to assess the risks of subjecting individual people to this policy. “

Dr Rachel Bingham – Clinical Advisor for Medical Justice

“Medical Justice calls for the immediate and urgent release from indefinite immigration detention of all those targeted with removal for Rwanda, and for the policy to be abandoned.  To not do so, given the medical evidence, means the harm the government is inflicting is premeditated.”

Emma Ginn – Director, Medical Justice

51 people in immigration detention targeted for removal to Rwanda have contacted Medical Justice – detail on 36 of whom is provided in the “Who’s Paying The Price?” report, including Iranian (14), Iraqi (5), Sudanese (5), Syrian (4), Eritrean (3), Vietnamese (2), Egyptian (2), and one Albanian nationals. This report shines a light on the accelerated and unclear process they have been subjected to, plagued by procedural deficiencies, a lack of legal advice and a lack of translated documents. They include men, women, aged-disputed children or young people, people with mental health conditions, and people who have self-harmed and/or have suicidal ideation in detention. They have all come to the UK seeking safety, many also to join family here. There is no specific screening process, despite the government implicitly acknowledging that removal would not be safe or appropriate for all. Where vulnerabilities are belatedly identified, the Home Office justifies continued detention on the basis of potential removal to Rwanda.

Our evidence shows that the prospect of removal to Rwanda is in itself damaging; it is exacerbating detained people’s mental health conditions (including depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)), causing them to experience fear, confusion, uncertainty about their safety, and a loss of hope. For some, it has increased their risk of self-harm and suicide. For some, it has reduced resilience to the psychological effects of trauma and may interfere with their ability to engage with treatment.

The harms described were experienced by individuals irrespective of whatever situation they would have encountered in Rwanda, and indeed despite their removal not having gone ahead.

Out of 17 people Medical Justice doctors have conducted clinical assessments for, 14 had evidence of torture histories and 6 have indicators of trafficking. 15 had a diagnosis or symptoms of PTSD. One is likely to have a psychotic disorder and lack capacity to even instruct his solicitor. One requires urgent investigations to rule out recurrence of a previous brain tumour. 11 people had suicidal thoughts in detention, including one who attempted suicide twice. Some were clinically considered to be at high risk of suicide if threatened with removal Rwanda.

Following each assessments the Medical Justice clinician shared their concerns, including about the risks of continued detention, with the immigration removal centre healthcare team.

The Medical Justice “Harmed Not Heard” report evidences that the Home Office process to identify and release highly vulnerable people in immigration detention is totally and utterly flawed.

The report analyses Medical Justice clinical assessments carried out between July and December 2021 for 45 clients detained in various immigration removal centres (IRCs) across the UK. These clients’ histories included severe trauma, significant mental health issues, and being at risk of suicide. Our findings include:

• 100% of these clients were assessed as at clinical risk of harm caused by detention and 82% had already experienced deterioration in their mental state by the time they were seen by a Medical Justice clinician. Not a single one of them had a safeguarding report, as they should have done, from the IRC healthcare department to identify them to the Home Office as at risk of harm under a process known as Rule 35(1)
• 67% had no communication of any type by the IRC healthcare department to the Home Office explicitly addressing the risk to their health from detention, prior to their assessment by a Medical Justice clinician
• 87% had suicidal and/or self-harm thoughts recorded by a Medical Justice clinician at their assessment – all were deprived of a safeguarding report identifying their risk of suicide (Rule 35(2))
• 76% were assessed by our clinicians as having symptoms or a diagnosis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
• Only 51% saw a GP within the required 24 hours of admission to the IRC. Where identified as needing a Rule 35 safeguarding report, the average wait for an appointment was 29 days – one person’s appointment took 119 days
• Home Office case-workers only released 1 of our 45 vulnerable clients when given information about their vulnerability under safeguarding processes, many of whom included torture survivors

“My health was getting worse in detention. I felt like I couldn’t live anymore, I didn’t know what to do, it was really really terrible … they knew what was happening to me, that I needed help…. There is no help. Ask healthcare, they blame it on the Home Office, and the Home Office will in turn blame healthcare. It feels like you are buried alive.”
Dr D, torture survivor, detained for 4 months despite deterioration in mental health

“Our medical evidence is that extensive Home Office failures mean its safeguarding processes are so ineffective they are basically fictional. Medical Justice fears torture survivors and people who are mentally ill and suicidal could be sent to Rwanda, given the ongoing gross Home Office systemic failures in safeguards for detained people. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Rwanda indicates that slavery and human trafficking survivors will be sent to Rwanda by the UK.

The impact on vulnerable asylum seekers could be devastating. Medical evidence of the harm inflicted would be beyond our reach so we would not be able to collate it in reports like “Harmed Not Heard” which are used to hold the government to account. These vulnerable asylum seekers could be ‘out of sight, out of mind’ in Rwanda with little chance of being heard.”
Medical Justice spokesperson

Evidence heard at public inquiry demonstrates extent of the Home Office’s safeguarding failures

The clinical expert appointed by the Brook House IRC Public Inquiry into mistreatment of detained people, Dr Jake Hard, concluded in March 2022 that there was “a complete systems failure” of safeguards to identify and release vulnerable people in detention. The Head of Healthcare, and the lead GP (still both working at Brook House IRC) gave evidence of systemic deficiencies and that they are continuing. Our report shows these deficiencies are not confined to Brook House and apply across the detention estate.

Victims of slavery and human trafficking, and possibly other vulnerable people, set to be sent to Rwanda

On 14^th April 2022 the Home Office announced its MoU outlining how asylum seekers will be sent to Rwanda. It commits to undertaking an “initial screening” of asylum seekers before sending them. The evidence from ‘Harmed Not Heard’, and from all our work since Medical Justice was founded in 2005, demonstrates that the Home Office is incapable of effective screening for vulnerabilities. This seems to be anticipated in the MoU which states the UK will take back and “resettle a portion of Rwanda’s most vulnerable refugees” in the UK. The MoU indicates that victims of modern slavery and human trafficking will be sent to Rwanda.

Vulnerable asylum seekers set to be held in quasi-detention in a tiny Yorkshire hamlet within weeks

Also announced on 14^th April is an ‘Accommodation Centre’ at RAF Linton-on-Ouse which the Home Office plans to open in a matter of weeks, where it will place 1,500 asylum seeking men. Linton-on-Ouse is village, with 500 residents, according to one of them.

The Home Office has said that Napier Barracks, where a few hundred asylum seeking men are placed, is the ‘pilot’ for ‘Accommodation Centres’. The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Immigration Detention considers Napier Barracks to be ‘quasi-detention’ and that asylum seekers placed there “have been subjected to appalling treatment and conditions”.

The APPG found that the Home Office had failed to apply it’s own “suitability criteria” which is meant to screen out highly vulnerable asylum seekers. The “suitability criteria” that the Home Office refers to for Linton-on-Ouse may be the same as at Napier, and as dysfunctional. The Home Office Factsheet for Linton-on-Ouse says “There will be robust processes in place to assess and manage vulnerabilities”, so it’s not clear to what extent, if at all, vulnerable asylum seekers are screened out.

Contact : Emma Ginn on 07786 517379 / emma.ginn@medicaljustice.or.uk

Read Full Report here

Home Office failings led to unsafe release of extremely vulnerable, unwell people without adequate support

New research published today by Medical Justice shows that Home Office failings have led to the unsafe release of extremely vulnerable and unwell people into the community, without adequate support.

One woman whose delay in treatment “could potentially have life or limb threatening consequences”, struggled to re-arrange an orthopaedic oncology appointment that she missed because she had been detained. One released Medical Justice client described how he ended up a number of times in Accident & Emergency, having been unable to secure a recommended cardiology appointment.

Some released from immigration detention had pre-existing vulnerabilities and medical conditions exacerbated by their time in detention, whilst other had attempted suicide, self-harmed or suicidal thoughts in detention.

Dr Rachel Bingham, Clinical Advisor at Medical Justice said :“These unsafe practices lead to greater unmet health needs, and to more serious health consequences, requiring more and longer treatments once people are able to access care. In the year reported on, over seventeen thousand people were released, despite the stated purpose of their detention being to remove them, indicating the senselessness of exposing people to these negative health consequences”

Ms A said : “I was getting prepped for major surgery when I was detained for 6 months. The healthcare at the Immigration Removal Centre was appalling. They failed to manage my condition and in the end had no choice but to release me. Although my health had deteriorated rapidly and the surgery was more urgent than ever, I was discharged without so much as a referral or medication. It was as if the centre was more concerned about washing their hands of me so they would not be held liable than they were about my aftercare. It was an awful experience and the whole time I was afraid for my health, and very, very anxious and emotionally distressed. I felt like nobody cared if I lived or died. It is unacceptable and inhuman in a first world country to treat people like this and it has to stop. Thankfully for me, my GP was very supportive and referred me back to the surgical team – I eventually had the surgery 7 months later.”

Thousands of people are released from detention into the community every year. Between 1 October 2020 and 30 September 2021, 81% of the 21,362 people detained were released back into the community.[1] 2,239 were considered to be ‘Adults at Risk’ whilst in detention by the Home Office,[2] however Medical Justice believes there to be far more vulnerable people in detention due to the systematic failures of the Adults at Risk policy to identify vulnerable people. With thousands released into the community every year, the impact of releasing those individuals in a medically unsafe release cannot be overstated.

The report Detained and Discarded: Vulnerable people released from immigration detention in medically unsafe way found that release from detention is often unplanned, chaotic and medically unsafe.

Medical Justice sees repeated cases of vulnerable people released into the community without adequate care plans, with little or no information and support about entitlement and how to access a GP, and rarely with referrals to community support services such as local mental health teams. This has included people who had very recently attempted suicide in detention.

One client said: “When I was told I was being released, no clinician or nurse gave me advice, my medication or any help with healthcare outside.”

Mohamed,[3] who was prescribed medication due to severe stomach pain and vomiting, was not provided with an adequate supply of his prescribed medication upon release and was not given his full medical records. As he did not have information or support about seeing a doctor in the community, he explained: “I experienced a long wait to see a doctor, meanwhile I was suffering during that time and I had no attention from anyone”.

Many experienced several of these issues at the same time, with a domino effect of one barrier leading to another. Additional difficulties were experienced with navigating the healthcare system in the community, as a result of their unstable immigration status and language barriers.

Abbas,[4] who suffers from physical health issues, including with his heart, and from depression and PTSD, struggled to see a cardiologist upon release. Despite having been recommended to see a cardiologist whilst in detention and by an A&E doctor in London after being released, it took over a year and a half for him to see a cardiologist. Abbas described multiple barriers he faced. For example, after being dispersed to outside of London, he explained: “Because of the language barrier and I had difficulty to go to London, I couldn’t go to the appointment.”

The report raises concerns about the Home Office’s application of its own policies on the safe release of vulnerable detainees as the unsafe release of people from detention persists.

Information obtained through Freedom of Information (FOI) requests suggests that the experiences of Medical Justice clients may be illustrative of a wider problem in the immigration detainee population. Shockingly, the Home Office revealed that only three people recorded as ‘Adult at risk’ had onward care plans arranged upon their release across three IRCs between January 2019 and June 2021.

The Home Office has further confirmed, in response to another FOI request, that it does not have any guidance or template letters for Home Office staff in IRCs to “advise individuals with health problems or those at risk of self-harm and/or suicide” at the point of release how to access health services in the community.

Immigration detention causes severe harm to those held there and can cause rapid deterioration over time. This is particularly true for those who have a history of mental health issues or a history of trauma. The Home Office failed to deliver on their responsibilities in accordance with their duty of care towards vulnerable individuals leaving detention and continues to toy with the lives of vulnerable people by releasing them in such an unsafe and dangerous way.

Related media article ;

British Medical Journal, 4th March 2022 : “Release of vulnerable people from immigration detention is often medically unsafe and chaotic, says charity”

[1] For statistics for September 2020 to September 2021, see Home Office National Statistics. 2021. Immigration Statistics, year ending September 2021. [Last accessed on 18 January 2022] Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-year-ending-september-2021/how-many-people-are-detained-or-returned and Home Office Detention Summary Tables. 2021. Immigration Statistics, year ending September 2021. [last accessed on 18 January 2022] Available here. Does not include those who were returned or those classed as ‘other’ which includes people who have returned to criminal detention, those released unconditionally, those sectioned under the Mental Health Act, deaths and absconds. It also does not include those held in Pre Departure Accommodation (PDA). See Home Office Detention Summary Tables. Immigration Statistics, year ending September 2021.

[2] Data extracted from statistics provided in Home Office response to FOIA 68200 received 22 February 2022. The number of Adults at Risk in PDA and those identified under column ‘other’ is not included. See Annex 1 for Home Office responses to Freedom of Information Access Requests.

[3] Mohamed’s name has been changed to protect his identity.

[4] Abbas’ name has been changed to protect his identity.

Since March 2020, our clients held in prisons under immigration powers have suffered profound harm as a result of indefinite solitary confinement.

Prisons have been put under a severe lockdown regime with people being locked in their cells for over 22 hours a day. Some have spent 24 hours a day in their cells, for days or weeks at a time.

Our joint report ​”Every day is like torture”: Solitary confinement & Immigration detention, published with Bail for Immigration Detainees, documents the disturbing suffering and harm people have endured. Our clients have experienced the onset of new mental health conditions and the distressing deterioration of pre-existing conditions and histories of trauma, such as survivors of torture.

The government suggest that the use of solitary confinement is a public health response to COVID-19. However, this cannot be justified; prolonged solitary confinement is a practice that has been prohibited internationally by the UN in their ‘Mandela Rules’.

This practice is another iteration of the government’s cruel treatment of immigration detainees, where there is a total disregard of individual rights and safety. It must end urgently.

Related media articles ;

The Independent, 11th July 2021 : “‘It’s psychological torture’: Immigration detainees tell of being locked up for up to 24 hours a day during pandemic”

The British Medical Journal, 18th June 2021

Consecutive government policies claiming to protect vulnerable people from the harmful impact of detention have failed to achieve their stated purpose and many continue to suffer avoidable harm in immigration detention. This report tells the story of some of those whom the policies failed.

The Home Office commissioned Stephen Shaw, a former Prison and Probation Ombudsman, to review the use of immigration detention in 2016. Following the highly critical Shaw review, which found that detention was being used too frequently, that too many people were ending up in detention and that safeguards were inadequate, we were hopeful that there may be significant reform addressing the systemic issues.

However, the government’s response – the so called Adults at Risk policy – has not achieved this aim and is not fit for purpose. What follows in this report is an outline of how the system fails individuals caught up in it, how people known to be at increased risk of harm in detention continue to be detained in what is widely accepted to be a harmful environment. Also the safeguards fail to identify the predictable deterioration of vulnerable detainees until serious harm has been inflicted; harm which may take years to recover from, if at all. This continues whilst ministers and civil servants loudly repeat their commitment to not detaining vulnerable people and despite all the evidence available of the harm detention inflicts.

The kinds of stories featured here should never happen. All of the people featured in this report are clients of Medical Justice.