The chief inspector of prisons has praised an immigration detention centre for families facing forced removal from Britain, which ministers have decided to close.
Peter Clarke, the chief inspector, says Cedars, which opened in 2011 near Gatwick airport, has been a “groundbreaking facility” that will now be lost despite significant human and financial investment over the past few years.
“Cedars produced the best outcomes for detainees that we have seen anywhere in immigration detention,” Clarke says in his report on an unannounced inspection of the centre carried out in June, before its closure was announced.
Robert Goodwill, the new immigration minister who announced the closure of the facility on 21 July, said the decision had been taken on grounds of value for money, reflecting its low level of use in the past few years as more families facing removal chose to return to their home countries voluntarily.
Goodwill said a “discrete unit” within the nearby Tinsley House immigration removal centre would be used instead. There is a 72-hour limit on the detention of families with children, extendable to up to seven days with ministerial authorisation.
Cedars, a large Edwardian house with extensive grounds, was opened as a secure facility to detain families as a result of a Liberal Democrat initiative in the coalition government in 2010 to end the routine immigration detention of children.
A family returns policy, overseen by an independent panel, was set up with an emphasis on voluntary returns and Cedars was opened to be used only as a last resort. The number of children detained fell from 1,119 in 2009 to 110 in the year to March 2016.
In his report, the chief inspector of prisons confirms that Cedars has been little used since it was last inspected in 2014, with 46 families having been held there and only 16 of them being removed from Britain.
“The low and decreasing level of use was ascribed by the Home Office to the success of the returns process and the fact that more families were accepting voluntary assistance to leave the UK. In addition, two recent reports had made reference to the cost of Cedars,” says Clarke in his introduction. He adds that 2,442 families have “entered the family returns process” since 2014, 1,597 of which have been removed from Britain.
The inspection report says the centre has been fitted out to a very high standard, with a kitchen and sitting room in each family apartment. There is also a fitness room, library, IT room, chapel, playroom and lounge areas. It adds that Cedars has gained an international reputation for the quality of its facilities.
Clarke praises the Home Office, the security company G4S and the children’s charity Barnardo’s for the way they jointly run the detention facility, saying it provides an excellent environment for children at a very stressful and potentially traumatic moment in their lives. He adds that force has not been used since the last inspection, nor family separation.
The decision by Home Office ministers to use a “discrete unit” in Tinsley House has been criticised by the chief executive of Barnardo’s, Javed Khan. “We do not feel that the new proposed accommodation is in the best interests of the children and have told ministers we cannot support the move,” he said.
The chief inspector of prisons will be monitoring the new facilities at Tinsley House.
