The UK has 9 Immigration Removal Centres (IRCs). In these IRCs people are locked up without trial, not for crimes committed, nor because they are suspected of terrorism but solely as a convenience whilst immigration applications are processed or whilst a person awaits a deportation decision. The timeframe for their detention is – indefinite. The period of detention in Immigration Removal Centres can last days, weeks, months or even years.The Verne Visitors Group (VVG) is a local volunteer organisation who visit people held in detention at The Verne, a former prison on Portland. The group’s first priority is to provide friendship and support to people detained at The Verne, but also aims to raise awareness about the immigration detention system.The Group is holding a public meeting to inform people of the despair and difficulty around detention and to highlight the injustice in the system. The meeting, entitled Stolen Lives: Despair on our doorstep’, will take place at the Corn Exchange in Dorchester on Friday 10th March at 7.30pm and will feature two nationally respected guest speakers.
The Reverend Dr Giles Fraser may be best known as the former Canon of St Paul’s Cathedral, and particularly for his support of the Occupy London protest. He is a regular BBC Radio 4 Moral Maze panellist and writes the ‘Loose Canon’ column in The Guardian. After visiting one of his parishioners who had been removed from his home and detained in The Verne last summer, Dr Fraser wrote a powerful article (‘Despair high above the glittering waters of Weymouth bay’) describing the heart-breaking situation.Dr Fraser will talk about his thoughts on the UK’s immigration detention system and his first-hand experience of dealing with the realities of its impact on people’s lives.
Andrew Wilson is Chair of the Trustees of the Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees (AVID), an organisation that supports and coordinates the groups of volunteers who visit people detained in the 11 IRCs across the UK. He is himself a volunteer visitor at Morton Hall IRC, Lincolnshire. He will provide insights into the background of immigration detention and the role of visitors. Excerpts from the film ‘Hidden Stories’, produced by AVID, giving voice to people who were released from detention, will also be shown.
Chair of the local Verne Visitors Group, Dr Charles Campion Smith told us “Many local people are not aware of what is happening on our doorstep. Over five hundred men, many of whom have committed no offence, are detained behind razor wire in this former prison.” He added “Their detention is indefinite, they do not know if and when they will be released and allowed to return to their families or if they will be deported. Whilst people are well-cared for, many are hundreds of miles away from friends and family. They feel very isolated and forgotten by society. The uncertainty of what lies ahead causes huge distress and despair, and this frequently has a negative effect on mental health.”
Expensive, ineffective and unjust; this is the conclusion of an All Party Parliamentary Group of MPs who examined the use of UK’s immigration detention in 2015. Whilst the Home Office states that detention is intended to be a short term arrangement there are people in The Verne and other IRCs who have been detained for long periods and simply don’t know for how long they will be held or what will happen to them.
Everyone is welcome to attend the public meeting and for further information about the Verne Visitors Group, please contact: [email protected] or www.vernevisitors.org.uk
