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Refugees: Tightening the Screw 121
The Labour government’s 1999 act provides for two automatic bail
hearings. There is no provision for further bail hearings after the first two.
Bail hearings may be heard in detention centres or prisons, even by TV link.
There is no guarantee of legal representation, although the act does
introduce legal aid for those fortunate enough to have found legal representatives.
The requirement for large sureties is unchanged. The bill did not
provide for a presumption of liberty. An acceptance of this right was one of
the few concessions won in committee and incorporated in the act, but it
was so hedged around with conditions as to be almost meaningless. Some
legal observers believe that the changes will make the situation worse rather
than better, providing a rubber stamp for the arbitrary decisions of
immigration officials.
The more than 800 refugees who are currently detained are held in a
variety of detention centres, in small holding centres at Heathrow, Gatwick
and other ports, in police stations and in many ordinary prisons. Up to half
are in the latter. The use of Pentonville prison was abandoned in the mid-
1990s after its governor and Board of Visitors objected to holding innocent
asylum seekers, and after several hunger strikes by Algerians and the death
in 1993 of a Zairean, Omasese Lumumba, as a result, the inquest jury ruled,
of the ‘use of improper methods and excessive force in the process of control
and restraint’ by prison officers. Asylum seekers began to be detained in the
mid-1980s. Initially the only detention centre available was Harmondsworth,
a decrepit collection of buildings near Heathrow airport, with
a capacity for 95 people; it had been used for immigration detainees since
1970 and was run by private security companies, first Securicor and then
Group 4; it is now finally to be abandoned and replaced in 2002 by a new
detention centre nearby at Hatton Cross, to be run by Burns Ltd, another
private security company. In 1987, when the Home Office ran out of
detention spaces, 100 refugees, mostly Sri Lankan Tamils, were detained in
a converted ferry in Harwich harbour; the ship broke its moorings in a storm
and ran aground, and the experiment was abandoned. In 1989 the Home
Office opened a new detention centre, run by the prison service, in an old
naval barracks at Haslar, near Portsmouth, with a capacity for 150 people;
detainees are kept in two large and noisy dormitories, but have access to
educational facilities and a sports ground. In November 1993 the
government opened another detention centre, Campsfield immigration
detention centre, which has a capacity of 200 and is run by Group 4. In July
1994 and May 1995 D and E wings of Rochester prison were redesignated
as detention wings, with a capacity of 198. Campsfield and Rochester
enabled more asylum seekers to be detained, rather than any reduction in
the numbers held in ordinary prisons. While the latter rose higher than ever,
to around 300, the total numbers detained increased from about 250 in early
1993 to over 600 in 1995 and about 750 in 1996. In May 1996 a new
purpose-built detention centre was opened at Tinsley House (sic) near
Gatwick airport, privately built by a subsidiary of the British Airports