Report provides first-hand accounts of life under UK deportation law
A recent report by Families for Justice examines how UK deportation laws negatively affect the lives of women and children.
The 32-page report, Separated Families: Unjust Deportations and The Families Left Behind, can be downloaded here.
Families for Justice is a group of women whose loved ones have been deported or are living at risk of deportation from the UK.
As noted in the report, UK deportation law currently requires that any person who is a national of another country and who serves a prison sentence of 12 months or longer will automatically be targeted for deportation.
In the report's foreword, Bella Sankey, the director of Detention Action, says the UK’s current deportation laws are "an affront to compassion and common sense" and are "built on decades of racism and xenophobia."
The report presents evidence and accounts of the real impacts of deportation law on the families it directly impacts. Five individual case studies are featured in the report, each one told in the words of the women affected.
Families for Justice explained: "We've written this report about unjust deportations after becoming unwilling experts on the issue. We've answered the phone at three AM to our partner, saying that the Home Office has taken him to the plane and he's calling to say goodbye. We've rushed across the country so our kids can have twenty minutes to say goodbye to their dad in the visitors room of a detention centre. We've spent sleepless nights worrying about our sons, waiting for the sound of an immigration officer knocking on the door - or even coming through the window - to take them away. In this report, you will find first-hand accounts of life under this law."
Overall, the report finds that little if any thought is given to the British families harmed by deportation and they are left alone to deal with discrimination, oppression, poverty and numerous barriers to justice.
A particular focus of the report is the impact that deportation has on the children of those deported.
Families for Justice says the first-hand experiences in its report convey the anxiety, the change in attachment, the excessive worry and other effects experienced by children caught up in the deportation process.
For example, one woman commented: "My five-year-old son has become very isolated and unsociable. He asks about his father every day and I have now run out of answers. My 14-year-old boy … has become emotionally distracted and isolated. He used to make friends easily and was a very sociable young boy and this has since changed."
According to the report, the experiences of Families for Justice members show that the Home Office is failing to consider its own guidance on assessing and understanding the impacts and risk posed to children directly affected by deportation decisions.
A failure to inform children about what is happening during the deportation process is highlighted as a concern by the report.
One child is quoted as telling a clinical psychologist: "[T]he one thing I regret about the whole situation is not being told to the full extent about the meaning of everything. I would have loved to have gone to the court. I would have loved to have tried to persuade the judge that it will affect me and it will change my life."
The report notes: "Whilst it could be thought that denying children access to the details and discussions of deportation is in their best interests, it is clear from the experience of [Families for Justice] members and the findings of the experts cited that the lack of information about the deportation of a loved parent has had considerable and potentially long-lasting mental health impacts on children."
The economic impact of deportation is also highlighted in the report, with Families for Justice noting it turns many women into single parents, depriving children of their fathers and leaving families financially and socially disadvantaged, with no additional support from the Government.
One woman explained: "Other than Families for Justice, my kids and I have had no support. It's difficult to talk to family and friends who haven't experienced this. I often feel like they don't get it or they're judging us because of the things they've seen on the news. We've also had no extra support from the Government. It amazes me that my British children have had their dad permanently ripped away from them, through no fault of their own, and no one has even bothered to call and ask how they're managing."
The report makes a number of policy recommendations, including calling for an overhaul of current UK deportation law. Families for Justice says the automatic deportation scheme should be replaced with a discretionary one that allows decisions that are genuinely in the public interest.
The report also calls for family members to be included in deportation decisions and to be provided with information and support.
On the legal process, the report recommends: "Immigration cases where there are children involved need a judicial system that is fit for assessing a child's best interests. A hybrid judicial approach is required so that a member from the various judicial systems such as the Family Court and Criminal Courts should be involved in Immigration and asylum Tribunals. In the Family Courts, the rights of British Children are paramount, yet when comparing a Family court to the Immigration Tribunal British children's rights are marginalised."