Recently in asylum seekers Category

How you're feeling about the Olympics, or Londinium MMXII, may well be dictated by where you live and work at this stage. If I wasn't a Londoner - totally dependent on public transport and, I'll admit, fairly ambivalent about most competitive sports - I reckon I'd be getting pretty excited by now. It is, of course, a special occasion. 

But instead, along with many Londoners, I'm grumbling at the mere thought of getting around London in July. So I don't exactly need another reason to feel slightly underwhelmed by this summer's big event, but it seems there is one. And it's far more serious than the potential for disrupted travel plans. 

The charity ECPAT UK is warning that there is a heightened risk of child trafficking around the games. We reported on the social work response to the games last year, and the message remains that more children are expected to be trafficked into the country this summer. It's difficult to quantify numbers, but ECPAT is urging those working with children to make sure they know how to recognise the signs of trafficking - by its nature, hidden - and respond effectively.

The charity - which has sat on the London Local Safeguarding Children Board Olympic sub-group for the past 18 months - has produced three detailed briefings and is running three training courses in the run up to the games. See here for more details.

Community Care Inform will soon be publishing six detailed guides on child trafficking and sexual exploitation. Contact kim.poupart@rbi.co.uk to find out more. (Picture credit: Ben Sutherland on flickr)

Morning all, here's a quick round-up of interesting things on the world wide web:

Children exposed to family violence show the same pattern of activity in their brains as soldiers exposed to combat, according to a study in the scientific journal Current Biology.

A report by the chief inspector of prisons has criticised Yarl's Wood immigration removal centre for repeatedly detaining expectant mothers, the Guardian reports.

And have a look at this creative 'A-Z of homelessness' artwork by homeless young people from The Connection, designed to prevent and raise awareness of homelessness.

Picture credit: dierk schaefer

In case you'd forgotten amid all the Munro excitement, today is the day the government promised the detention of children for immigration purposes would end. (Although progress on this promise, like so many of the coalition's, hasn't gone well).

And if there weren't enough reasons to end child detention, the Children's Society has today published new research warning of the on-going dangers of detaining children.

The report - which examined the experiences of 32 families detained prior to the coalition's May 2010 pledge to end child detention - evidences children's traumatic experiences while being detained, which the government should be at pains to avoid.

These include children witnessing hunger strikes, suicide attempts and the use of restraint on their parents. The majority of children also experienced emotional distress, including sleeplessness, nightmares and constant crying, and ongoing health problems post-release.

Although children will no longer be detained at the Bedfordshire-based Yarl's Wood immigration removal centre, it is not yet clear how they will be treated while detained in the UK Border Agency's new 'pre-departure accommodation' near Gatwick airport. (At which Barnardo's will, somewhat controversially, be running welfare services.)

Bob Reitemeier, chief executive of The Children's Society, said: "We will be paying particular attention to whether detention in pre-departure accommodation will be used as a genuine last resort, for the shortest time possible, and in the most exceptional cases. It is not yet clear if it will be just another form of detention that harms children.

He said the report highlighted how critical it is that "lessons are learned from the past and the needs and welfare of children in the asylum system are at the heart of the process."

Picture credits: smemon87 and DIAC Images

Interesting piece from former children's commissioner Sir Al Aynsley-Green here on the mixed messages sent out by Barnardo's decision to run welfare services at the government's proposed detention centre near Gatwick airport.

Little extract: "This worrying development raises key questions, namely, are the big children's organisations effective advocates for children, or are they friends of Government? Can they be both, and if so, how and with what evidence of impact?

A landmark Supreme Court ruling today has paved the way for families facing deportation to remain in the UK if it is in the best interests of their children.

In the case of ZH (Tanzania) v SSHD [2011] UKSC4, the Supreme Court allowed a Tanzanian woman who was threatened with deportation to remain in the UK because removing her would breach the Article 8 human rights of her two children - the right to private and family life.

This was despite her chequered immigration history, which included two asylum claims under a false name. The decision will mean that courts must consider the best interests of children in cases where a parent is threatened with deportation.

Syd Bolton and Baljeet Sandhu, co-directors of the Refugee Children's Rights Project, said the decision marked a "significant step forward". In a joint statement they said: "The court has now set in stone the need to recognise the rights of the child and has sought to address the injustice done to children when immigration control is put before their welfare and needs."

They said the ruling highlighted the vulnerability of children in the immigration system, who will be denied access to justice, they claimed, under the government's proposals to cut legal aid funding. "If these proposals come to fruition an important case such as this may have never reached the court's doors," they stated

They called for the courts, the UK Border Agency and the Legal Services Commission to put in place "child-sensitive procedures to ensure that this judgment is given full effect in their duties to safeguard children, and that in all decisions about children and their families, their best interests should customarily dictate the outcome".

Picture credit: Rex Features

The High Court has slammed the UK Border Agency for unlawfully detaining two families and failing to implement detention policy properly.

The judge, Mr Justice Wyn Williams, found that the detention of the families of Reetha Suppiah and Sakinat Bello breached their right to libery and family life under articles 5 and 8 of the Human Rights Act 1998. It provided further evidence of detention policy not being properly applied, he said, and of the long-term harm it can cause to children.

The families could now claim thousands of pounds in damages, according to reports.

"The cases of the two families involved in this litigation provide good examples of the failure by UKBA to apply important aspects of the policy both when the decisions were taken to detain each family and when decisions were taken to maintain detention after removal directions had been cancelled," Justice Wyn Williams said.

Penny Nicholls, director for children and young people at The Children's Society, said the case highlights "that immigration detention of children should be ended immediately".

"It is disappointing that, given the vast body of evidence of the harm experienced by children in detention, we continue to see children detained. However, we are encouraged that the Government has committed to ending the detention of children...and we are keen to work with them to ensure that cases like this become a thing of the past".

Last month - after disappointing progress on its promise to end child detention immediately - the government announced that the unpopular practice of detaining children in immigration removal centres will end by May 2011.

Don't forget to tune into tonight's Dispatches: The Kids Britain Doesn't Want, Channel 4, 8pm. It will shine the spotlight on asylum seeking children - particularly timely given the government's rather slow progress on its pledge to end child detention.

Here's the official blurb: Every year thousands of children come to Britain seeking refuge from persecution, terrorism and war. But many arrive to find this country is not the place of safety they expected. Instead they are met by a culture of disbelief and an asylum system that in some cases causes them profound psychological and physical harm.

Through the stories of a 10-year-old Iranian boy, a 16-year-old Afghan and a young Ugandan woman, Dispatches explores the experiences of young people brutalized by the British Asylum system. This is the story of the kids Britain doesn't want.