Healthcare: Yarl’s Wood

Stella Creasy Excerpts

Wednesday 6th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) for securing the debate. For me, as for her and for the right hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman), this is a powerfully emotive subject. It is a debate about pride and shame.

I am proud to be the Member for Walthamstow. When I was elected, the then Member for Blackburn told me that there were two divides in the House: between left and right; and between those who have to deal with the UK Border Agency and those who do not. That was a pretty accurate description.

I am also proud to be a member of the Set Her Free campaign and to work with Women for Refugee Women—some of those women live in my community and I have been proud to campaign with them about Yarl’s Wood. Set Her Free is above all about giving voice, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton did so eloquently, to those women detained at Yarl’s Wood now and whose voices we cannot hear unless others speak out for them. We are here today to speak out for those 2,000 women, the majority of whom we know to be the victims of rape and sexual torture and of persecution in their own countries. Yet when they come to our shores, this is how we treat them.

The healthcare problems are only the pinnacle of the injustice that Yarl’s Wood represents in our community. Many of the detainees have mental as well as physical healthcare problems: one in five has tried to kill themselves and 40% of them self-harm. Those figures come from the valiant work done by Women for Refugee Women to hold us to account for the existence of Yarl’s Wood. That work was cruelly disbelieved by the Home Office, so the report from Her Majesty’s inspectorate of prisons showing a tripling in the number of women self-harming in Yarl’s Wood should be testament to the work done by Women for Refugee Women to uncover just what the truth is about such a place in our society here in Britain in 2016.

[Catherine West]

My hon. Friend is making a passionate and excellent speech. Will she join me in underlining that when there is no statutory limit on the period of detention those mental health issues such as the self-harming become worse?

[Stella Creasy]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for saying that, because she brings me to exactly what shames me. I feel shame about what is happening today in our country. I am ashamed that the UK is the only European country with no limit on detention, which absolutely compounds the mental health distress felt by many of those in Yarl’s Wood. I am ashamed that the HMIP report also reveals that male members of staff are supervising women on suicide watch—as Women for Refugee Women warned us was happening. What does that mean in layman’s terms? Vulnerable women are being watched as they sleep or as they use the lavatory. How is that happening in our country, on our shores?

I am also ashamed that all of that is futile, because two thirds of the women whom we lock up in Yarl’s Wood are then set free and, as Members have talked about, 90% of the pregnant women are set free. What is the point of putting them through that torture? I am ashamed, because it is not even value for money. As the right hon. Member for Meriden pointed out, it costs us £40,000 a year to hold those women in detention. We could find much cheaper, much more humane and much more dignified ways in which to manage our asylum system.

Above all, I am ashamed that we do not hear the voices of those women. I therefore want to read directly from their testament. The right hon. Member for Meriden cited a case, but I will read from the account of a woman who was not pregnant. The best way in which to guarantee the healthcare of women in Yarl’s Wood is to close the place down altogether. Let me read this out:

“When I came to England I was destitute, I was homeless. I went to Croydon to the Home Office to explain my situation. Before I could say anything, the lady said to me, you are lying. I said, God knows if I am lying…Then they took me to a room. Nobody told me they were taking me to detention. A lady said to me, they are taking you to another immigration office. They put me in handcuffs. I did not know what was going on. Since I was born I had never left my country before. They put me in the van and took me to Yarl’s Wood. They searched me. I wasn’t able to ask what was going on, because I was too scared of them. Nobody told me what was going on. They said, you are in fast track, but I didn’t know what that was.

While I was in detention, I was seriously sick, I was dying. My body collapsed. There were times when I could not walk. They took me to healthcare, they said you must eat, but I couldn’t eat the food. I was skinny, I was dying.”

This is 2016. We have had such debates for a number of years. It is not cost-effective, moral or effective in the modern world to have somewhere such as Yarl’s Wood in Britain. It should shame us all that it is happening on our shores. I ask the Minister, please, set her free.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. May I congratulate the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) at the outset on securing this debate and on her contribution? I know that she feels strongly about this subject and has been committed to it over a period of time and since she has been in the House. I know how deeply she feels about these issues, as her contribution showed. I am genuinely grateful for the manner in which she has approached this debate.

As the hon. Lady indicated, one of the first things I did following the general election and my reappointment as the Immigration Minister was to visit Yarl’s Wood, recognising a number of the issues raised about the centre, and I specifically visited the healthcare centre at that time. I can certainly assure her and other Members of our focus on this issue and, indeed, the importance that the Home Secretary and I attach to the dignity and welfare of those in detention. That is of the utmost importance, and we take those responsibilities extremely seriously. I hope to talk about some of the generalities of the policy, to focus on Yarl’s Wood specifically and to address rule 35 access to independent medical examinations, as well as some of the other points flagged up, in the time available to me.

Our policy is that vulnerable people should not normally be detained under immigration powers. Our processes are designed generally to prevent vulnerable individuals from being detained unless there are very exceptional circumstances and, when vulnerability emerges after the point of initial detention, we aim to act quickly and appropriately.

Reference has been made to the Shaw review. Indeed, the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) highlighted it in his contribution. The Home Secretary commissioned Stephen Shaw to carry out an independent review of welfare in detention—that is, in immigration removal centres, in short-term holding facilities and for detainees under escort. The review considered many of the issues discussed in today’s debate. Mr Shaw was asked to look at current systems and policies, including those in place for identifying vulnerability, managing both the mental and physical health of detainees, providing welfare support, preventing self-harm and self-inflicted death, assessing risk, managing food and fluid refusal, and safeguarding. We have received Mr Shaw’s report and, as I indicated on Report of the Immigration Bill, it is our intention to publish both the report and our response to it before Committee consideration of the Bill in the House of Lords. That remains our intention.

[Stella Creasy]

Will the Minister give way?

[James Brokenshire]

I was just about to address the detention issues raised by the hon. Lady, as well as those raised by the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion). The hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) referred to fast track in her contribution. I underline that I made the decision to suspend detained fast track—in other words, where an asylum case is being considered—because I was not satisfied with the safeguarding provisions around vulnerability. I will reintroduce it only when I am satisfied that appropriate processes and procedures are in place to ensure its safe reintroduction.

[Stella Creasy]

Will the Minister confirm whether, when the Government respond to the Shaw report, there will be clarity as to whether they consider women who are victims of rape and sexual torture—that is, two thirds of the residents of Yarl’s Wood—to be vulnerable in and of themselves, and therefore inappropriate for detention?

[James Brokenshire]

I will be careful not to pre-empt the Government’s response, but the hon. Lady will not have long to wait for the Shaw report. I recognise the importance attached to it. Indeed, the Home Secretary commissioned the report because of the importance we attach to it. My comments today will be based on the position as it stands, but the Government will have more to say on these issues shortly.