Vulnerable Targets for Immigration Control

Image from the Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission

The UK incarcerated 2,000 children in the year 2007. Many of them born in the UK, but not citizens. Amanda Shah, writing in the London Independent, explains that the "children [in detention] literally begin to waste away. Many suffer weight loss, developmental difficulties and regressive bedwetting or soiling."

With the frequent reports and complaints of conditions in ICE detention centers, there has been little description of what actually happens to the children. There is no mention of "wasting away," or "developmental difficulties" or regressive bedwetting or soiling." Yet, how can the children not react in this way? It seems like the bedwetting would be a frequent topic of conversation at a detention center, yet nothing is said. Maybe it's not a good topic to bring up; too personal and intimate, and indicates on the part of the child some real suffering that goes further than a situational depression.

There is another aspect to the immigration debate and frequent ICE raids that our government does not consider. What child wouldn't develop Post Traumatic Stress when their parent is taken away, or threatened to be taken away? I think about the nursing baby who was separated from her mother for several days. It was reported that child became dehydrated. What would a child psychiatrist say about the experience of this particular child? (see post "Conflicts Between Ethics and the Law, November 21, 2007)

-----

Amanda Shah: Cruelty inflicted on children

Published: 02 January 2008
The London Independent

This Government must recognise that in many cases of families who have been in the UK for long periods, removal is not appropriate or fair.

This Government must recognise that in many cases of families who have been in the UK for long periods, removal is not appropriate or fair.

Every year, without judicial scrutiny, the Government locks up 2,000 children in the UK "for the purposes of immigration control". Yet these children – the sons and daughters of asylum-seekers and immigrants – have committed no crime. Many were born in this country and know no other home. Asked where they are from, they will say: "London", "Swansea" or "Doncaster".

According to government policy, "Every Child Matters", except, that is, children the Government wants to remove from this country. They can be incarcerated indefinitely.

Each detention costs the taxpayer hundreds of pounds a week. This is a scandalous waste of money and damages young lives. The children literally begin to waste away. Many suffer weight loss, developmental difficulties and regressive bedwetting or soiling. A study we conducted in 2005 with Médecins Sans Frontières – a humanitarian organisation more used to working in war zones – concluded that detention damages the mental and physical health of children and their parents.

Yet there is no evidence to suggest that children or their families abscond if left in the community. Children's education, health needs and friendships mean they are rooted in the places where they live. But the Government uses these families as soft targets to show middle England that it is "tough on immigration".

Over the past 12 months, the cruelty inflicted on many families has become increasingly incomprehensible. Children can be taken into the care of social services while their parents are detained to prevent them absconding. Or the Government may order the removal of a child with one parent from the UK, while the other parent remains here in detention. Confused? You can see how utterly bewildering it must be for the families involved.

With a new year upon us, surely this is one resolution the Home Secretary must make and keep: "In 2008, I will stop detaining children."

Amanda Shah is assistant director of Bail for Immigration Detainees

article: http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article3300977.ece
image: http://www.hreoc.gov.au/human_rights/children_detention_report/art/cover.jpg

link to Report from the National Inquiry into Children in Immigrant Detention (Australia)
http://www.hreoc.gov.au/human_rights/children_detention_report/report/index.htm