Facts & Figures

The following three broad groups can be detained under immigration act powers[1]:

• People subject to immigration control who can be detained pending examination and a decision on whether to grant, cancel, or refuse leave to enter.
• People subject to immigration control who have entered the UK illegally or overstayed a visa; have been refused leave to enter; have failed to observe conditions attached to leave to enter; who have used deception in seeking leave to remain; can be detained along with their family members who are not British pending examination and a decision on whether to issue removal directions and pending administrative removal. People reasonably suspected of falling within these categories can also be detained.
• People who are the subject of a criminal court recommendation for deportation can be detained at specific stages of the deportation procedure.

Around 60% of people held in detention have made an asylum claim at some point Asylum applicants can be held in detention at any stage of their application and prior to their removal from the UK if their application is refused.

Foreign nationals may be detained when attending interviews with the Home Office or at a police station when they attend to comply with weekly or monthly reporting requirements. Others may be detained after they are discovered to be living or working in the UK without permission Time-served foreign national prisoners may continue to be held in prison under Immigration Act powers or be transferred to a removal centre after completing their sentence and prior to their removal or deportation, or while deportation action is pursued by the Home Office Others in detention include migrants facing removal after arriving illegally or overstaying a visa There are some overlaps between these categories.

How long are people detained for? Is there a time limit?

There is no maximum period of detention. In BID's experience, in many cases the Home Office has used administrative detention for prolonged periods of time. BID is concerned that these periods of detention are excessive and unlimited and serve as examples of the failure to set a statutory limit to immigration detention BID recommends that there should be a statutory time limit to detention in line with the 2007 recommendation of the Joint Committee on Human Rights that "where detention is considered unavoidable…subject to judicial oversight the maximum period should be 28 days"[2].

Are there any groups of asylum seekers or foreign nationals who can't be detained?

Any asylum seeker or migrant can be detained on the authority of an immigration officer under Immigration Act powers The Home Office's own instructions set out categories of people who are "normally considered suitable for detention in only very exceptional circumstances" . These include pregnant women (unless there is the clear prospect of early removal), those suffering from serious medical conditions that cannot be satisfactorily managed in detention, or the mentally ill, and those cases where there is independent evidence of torture However, BID's experience is that vulnerable people are detained, often without access to appropriate or adequate medical help BID routinely encounters detainees people held in detention in spite of having evidence of being tortured, are survivors of rape victims, pregnant women, and people with severe mental and physical health problems, survivors of rape, and pregnant women.

How much does it cost to detain someone?

Damian Green, Minister of State for Immigration, told the House of Commons recently that the average daily cost of detianing a person in immigration detetnin is £110. This is the most recent figure provided, but it is not clear what costs are included in this figure [4]

Asylum claims & the Detained Fast Track

Asylum seekers of any nationality can be detained for their asylum claim to be heard under an accelerated legal process called the Fast Track [5] if the Home Office believes their case is straightforward and it will be possible to make a speedy decision on their claim The Home Office sees the detained fast track as an integral part of its New Asylum Model (NAM), announced in 2006, for deciding asylum claimsannounced in 2006, and . the It Home Office intends to process around 30% of new asylum claims in detention.[6]. Currently there a Super Fast fast Track track process in operation at Harmondsworth IRC (for men) and Yarl's Wood IRC (for women), where a first decision on an asylum claim is given within three days.

BID is concerned that the detained fast track process is inherently unfair to detainees for a number of reasons With only a small number of exclusion categories, any asylum claim can be routed into the detained fast track regardless of the complexity of the case or whether it can be heard properly within the accelerated legal time frame. Home Office policy on cases unsuitable for detention (such as victims of torture and children) is routinely breached in the exercise of the detained fast track process. Furthermore, while the Home Office is always represented at appeal hearings, there is no automatic publicly funded legal representation for asylum appeals in detention. As a result, the success rate of appeals in detention is greatly reduced[7].

Footnotes

[1] Laura Dubinsky, (2008), "An Introduction to Immigration Detention" in ‘Immigration Detention: Locked up and forgotten?' Doughty Street Chambers training material.

[2] Joint Committee on Human Rights, The Treatment of Asylum Seekers: Tenth Report from Session 2006-07, 22nd March 2007, para 276.

[3] Home Office, "'Controlling our borders: making migration work for Britain _ Five Year Strategy for asylum and immigration"' 7 February 2005, available at http://www.archive2.official-documents.co.uk/document/cm64/6472/6472.

[4] Hansard (Citation: HC Deb, 11 October 2010, c198W)

[5] Under specific circumstances detailed in the UK Border Agency's Suitability List, latest version published in 2007.

[6] ILPA, (2008), ‘The Detained Fast Track Process: A best practice guide'. Immigration Law Practitioners Association', London

[7] For more details refer to the BID briefing paper on the detained fast track available at http://www.biduk.org/pdf/Fast%20track/BID%20briefing%20paper%20on%20DFT.pdf March 2008.