Immigration: Removal Centres

Lord Roberts of Llandudno Excerpts

Monday 14th January 2019 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how long the longest serving person currently detained in an immigration removal centre has been held in detention; and what is the longest time a person has been so detained since 2014.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, unpublished management information shows that the longest-serving person currently detained has been held for three years and that the longest period of detention since 2014 is six years and eight months. That individual was released in October 2017. In each case the detainees were foreign national offenders convicted of very serious offences, including serious violence and serious sexual offending. I am confident that our reforms will prevent such long periods of detention being necessary, while not lessening our determination to remove foreign national offenders.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno (LD)]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that only we and the Republic of Ireland have no maximum timeframe for detention? Does she also accept what the United Nations action group on arbitrary detention stated:

“Lack of knowledge about the end date of detention is seen as one of the most stressful aspects of immigration detention, in particular for stateless persons and migrants who cannot be removed for legal or practical reasons”?


Is this not only indefinite detention but indefinite hopelessness? Should not we in the United Kingdom agree with the remainder of Europe, apart from Ireland, that we will put an end to it so that everybody will know exactly what the prospects are for their release?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, the law does not allow indefinite detention. It is our view that a fixed, arbitrary time limit on detention would actually serve only to encourage individuals to frustrate the removal procedures in order to reach a point at which they would have to be released.