Brook House IRC Detainees Suffered Unacceptable Treatment
A report published today by the Brook House Inquiry presents the results of a comprehensive investigation into the mistreatment of detainees at Brook House immigration removal centre (IRC) following a BBC Panorama programme broadcast in 2017.
The report is in three volumes, totalling over 700 pages. The investigation covers the period between 1 April 2017 and 31 August 2017 at the IRC located in the grounds of Gatwick Airport. At the time, the IRC was operated by the contractor G4S. A helpful summary is available courtesy of the 8-page statement made by Kate Eves, the chair of the Brook House Inquiry, on the launch of the report. It is reproduced in full below.
Eves said the report reveals a "toxic" culture at the IRC, with credible evidence that detainees suffered mistreatment contrary to Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Brook House was prison-like and entirely unsuitable for detaining people for anything other than a short period of time. Staff used force inappropriately, and used dehumanising, abusive, racist and derogatory language. Management was dysfunctional.
The charity Medical Justice said in summing up the findings of the report: "The [Brook House Inquiry] has exposed the inexcusable and unconscionable dehumanising abuse of vulnerable people held in immigration detention by the Home Office. The Inquiry has found the safeguarding system in detention to be 'dysfunctional', resulting in a failure to protect detained people as intended. Vulnerable people were exposed to the risk of mistreatment and were subjected to actual harm; there were 19 incidents of credible breaches of Article 3 of the ECHR, which prohibits torture, inhuman and degrading treatment within a 5 month period. … [P]eople were found to have been 'allowed to deteriorate' in their mental and physical health. Such failures were found to be interlinked with the inappropriate use of segregation and a quick resort to the use of force to manage incidents of self-harm and mental health crises. Healthcare failures put vulnerable people at risk of deteriorating in their health, and of instances of mistreatment."
Read more: EIN, https://tinyurl.com/57cccuvd
Calendar of Racism and Resistance (29 August – 12 September 2023)
Institute of Race Relations (IRR)
We return from the summer hiatus with a question. Why, despite decades of evidence, damning inquiries and telling statistics, do anti-racists have to continually debate the existence of structural racism?
Despite the fact that in the UK, people from Black, Asian, GRT and other minority ethnic backgrounds are more likely to be in poverty, insecure work and sub-standard housing, governments and policymakers have bolstered the idea that cultural factors such as poor diet, family breakdown or ‘victim mentalities’ determine deprivation as opposed to social conditions, powerlessness and financial inequality.
As long-time readers will know, this increasingly prevalent argument was made in the government’s Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities in March 2021 which suggested that geography, family influence, socio-economic background, culture and religion all impacted on life chances more than racism, with Commission chair Tony Sewell concluding he had found no evidence of institutional racism in all the areas examined.
To demystify the ways that poverty and deprivation help structure institutional racism across society, IRR News is back with a significant update to the IRR Statistics section, where we bring together data collated from organisations working across fields of housing, homelessness, employment, social security, debt relief, children’s rights and more.
This extensive page provides analysis behind the data, and shows why it’s crucial to avoid presenting statistics in ways that distort our understandings of race and class and the interplay between them. In the teeth of the worst cost-of-living crises in decades, with most schools in England giving out food and clothes to children, our calendar of racism of resistance this week highlights an Institute for Fiscal Studies report that warns social mobility is at its lowest point since the 1970s, disproportionately impacting BME groups.
In such desperate times, the government has announced its intention to expand invasive facial recognition technology (known to perpetuate racial discrimination) in supermarkets as a way to tackle shoplifting. The IRR has signed a letter coordinated by Liberty to The Times criticising the move and calling on the government to support, not punish those struggling to survive.
Calendar of Racism and Resistance (29 August – 12 September 2023)
Anti-Fascism and the Far Right
Policing | Prisons | Criminal Justice System
Discrimination | Equalities | Human Rights
Electoral Politics | Government Policy
Education
Housing | Poverty | Welfare
Health And Social Care
Culture | Media | Sport
Racial Violence And Harassment
Asylum | Migration | Borders | Citizenship
Asylum and migrant rights
Borders and internal controls
Reception and detention
Written by: IRR News Team, https://tinyurl.com/d98h2da9
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Europe’s Lack of New Ideas on Migration is the Real Crisis
When the European Commission president arrived on the island of Lampedusa in Italy on September 17, it was an opportunity to reset Europe’s broken approach to migration. Instead, we got a 10-point plan of ineffective and abusive policies, with some wishful thinking.
European Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen presented the plan after a three-hour visit on the island, where thousands of people had arrived on more than one hundred boats over the previous days. At one point, there were 7,000 migrants and asylum seekers, overwhelming Lampedusa’s inadequate reception facility. Transfers to the mainland eased the overcrowding, but not before Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni exploited the human drama for political purposes.
The Commission’s plan includes staples of the EU’s failed approach: throwing money at countries like Tunisia and Libya to prevent departures, cracking down on smuggling networks, increased surveillance, accelerated asylum procedures to swiftly deny protection and send people away, and futile information campaigns to discourage people from getting on unsafe boats. None of these approaches have stopped people attempting the dangerous journey or addressed the root causes of displacement and migration. Some have instead increased the danger.
The plan contains a pledge to “continue working to offer alternatives such as humanitarian admission and legal pathways” but without concrete commitments, the outcome will be more of the same.
Read more: Judith Sunderland, Human Rights Watch, https://tinyurl.com/pcapvp5x
Immigration and Asylum Legal Aid Sector Has ‘Collapsed’
An important new report published yesterday by the Public Law Project (PLP) and Haringey Migrant Support Centre (HMSC) is the latest to detail the crisis in the availability of immigration and asylum legal aid across England and Wales.
PLP and HMSC said: "This report summarises the experiences of organisations attempting to help people access immigration legal aid advice and the experiences of over-stretched legal aid providers who are unable to meet the demand in their areas, as well as those who have given up on legal aid as a sustainable area of legal practice."
In the main report, PLP and HMSC say starkly that the immigration legal advice sector has effectively collapsed, leaving people adrift in an ocean of unmet need.
Read more: EIN, https://tinyurl.com/249u6r5w
‘Radical Reorientation’ Needed as Half of Humanity Lacks Basic Health Coverage
Over 4.5 billion people worldwide lack coverage for essential health services the UN health agency said on Monday 18/09/2023, underscoring the need for stronger political commitment and increased government investment. Moreover, two billion face severe financial hardships when paying out-of-pocket for necessary medical treatment, according to a joint World Health Organization (WHO)-World Bank report.
“The fact that so many people cannot benefit from affordable, quality, essential health services not only puts their own health at risk, it also puts the stability of communities, societies and economies at risk,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. We urgently need stronger political will, more aggressive investments in health, and a decisive shift to transform health systems based on primary health care.”
Alarm for global health goals. - This crisis poses a major threat to global health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that aim to achieve universal health coverage for all by 2030. According to the report, over the past two decades, fewer than one-third of countries globally have improved health service coverage and reduced the “catastrophic” levels of out-of-pocket health spending, which often exceed 25 per cent of household income.
Read more: United Nations, https://tinyurl.com/mrxsyjj7
Ten Challenges for the United Nations (UN) in 2023-2024
1. Regaining Political Relevance in Sudan
2. Restoring Development Support for Afghanistan
3. Helping Haiti Emerge From Its Political and Security Crisis
4. Navigating a Dangerous Road to Elections in South Sudan
5. Finding New Avenues for Political Engagement in Mali
6. Regaining a Political Foothold in Ukraine
7. Managing the Security Risks of Artificial Intelligence
8. Using the momentum created by the New Agenda for Peace’s call to dismantle the patriarchy
9. Advancing the Peace Agenda at COP28
10. Continuing the Quest for UN Security Council Reform
Read the full breifing: Crissis Group, https://tinyurl.com/y2mee7df
Frank Ospina Begged to be Sent Home - But Died in UK Detention
The family of a Colombian man who is believed to have killed himself at a Heathrow immigration removal centre say he begged for help and was willing to leave the UK. Frank Ospina died within a month of being detained, while he was waiting to be deported. His family say he had no existing mental health problems.
The BBC has been investigating conditions inside immigration centres, at a time when the government is taking a harder line on migrants. We have also uncovered new details about an incident in which a group of detainees tried to kill themselves in the days following Frank's death. It comes ahead of the publication of a report, due next week, into abusive behaviour by staff at the Brook House facility, a centre near Gatwick. A public inquiry was launched following a landmark undercover BBC Panorama investigation, in 2017.
The BBC has been given internal documents from inside the immigration system obtained by two organisations, the human rights journalism unit Liberty Investigates, and the charity, Medical Justice. The documents suggest there is growing frustration among those being held at immigration centres because of delays to the resolution of their cases, which are in turn having a negative impact on detainees' mental health.
Frank Ospina, 39, a Colombian engineering graduate, came to the UK in late 2022 to visit his mother, who had settled here, and to visit prospective universities. Having decided to instead enrol on a master's course in Spain, which was due to begin in May, his family say he took a short-term job washing dishes. But as a foreign national Frank did not have the right to work in the UK. He was arrested in an immigration raid, and taken to the Heathrow detention centres.
Read more BBC News, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66791416
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