Yarl's Wood | >Re-PHOTO

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood – September 2016

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood: Saturday 10th September 2016 was one of quite a few protests I photographed at the Immigration Detention Centre at Yarls Wood, and it followed a similar pattern to the others.

The main difference to most other occasions I went there was the weather, with some heavy and rather persistent rain, which failed to dampen the energy of the protesters but did make the event more hazardous.

The 20ft high fence around the centre – essentially a prison – is at the bottom of a slope in the field where the protest took place. From higher up the slope you can see the upper floors of one of the detention blocks though the top 10ft of thick wire metal fencing.

Around the base of the fence is a concrete base several feet wide, and in front of that is a short level grass-covered section before the ground rises. In the rain the level section became waterlogged mud and climbing the slope became extremely treacherous, and nearly impossible and I had to walk some yards to one side where the slope was less steep.

Between speeches over the public address system the protesters had brought so the women inside the prison could hear them clearly – even those who the prison staff had prevented from coming to the rooms facing the fence – people kicked and banged the lower 10 feet of metal sheet fencing – which made a very satisfactory loud noise.

My account on My London Diary was short – so here it is in full, although there is more information in some of the captions to the many images in the post there:

Hundreds of protester braved persistent rain to stand for several hours in a protest organised by Movement for Justice waving and shouting support to the women asylum seekers held indefinitely inside Yarl’s Wood, who responded enthusiastically by shouting and waving back from the prison blocks behind the high fence, hindered by windows that hardly open.

Several spoke to the protesters on their mobile phones, some telling how Serco security guards had prevented them from coming to the windows and were threatening those who greeted the protesters with solitary confinement, and there were speeches by a procession of women who had been held, some for a year or more, inside the immigration prison.

*No Limits – Sin Fronteras states the Latin American Young Women’s banner*

Immigration detainees are held ‘indefinitely’ with no release date until their cases are determined. One of those then inside was 42-year-old Mabel Gawanas who had then been held in Yarls Wood for over 2 years, having fled Namibia after being tortured and raped. She has an an underage British daughter and several health problems. She was eventually released after being held one day short of three years.

*As well as the women there were some families on the lower floor*

Many of those who spoke had been detained inside Yarls Wood – and were able to speak to friends still inside and to encourage them to keep up the fight. Most who do fight will succeed eventually, but too many who should be granted asylum are being deported – and often back into very dangerous situations.

*Sisters Uncut and others set off flares on the hill facing Yarl’s Wood immigration prison.*

By the time the protest was coming to an end my boots were encased in heavy clay mud. I scraped off most of it on the long walk back to the coach, but still had to remove my boots and put them in a plastic bag before getting into the coach in my socks. But I was pleased with many of the pictures I had made and I think the bad weather brought out the best in the protesters.

Many more pictures at Shut Down Yarl’s Wood.

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Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14 – 2018

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14 – Yarl’s Wood immigration prison, near Bedford

The protest outside Yarl’s Wood Immigration Detention Centre on Saturday 14th July 2018 was the fourteenth on the remote site built on a wartime air base organised by Movement for Justice, although I had been covering protests in and around London calling for the closure of this and the other immigrant prisons for over 10 years.

I’d been at most of the previous thirteen at the site, although I had missed the first, largely because of transport problems – living outside London it wasn’t practical for me to travel on one of the coaches organised from London. In July 2018 I came with my bike on the train to Bedford and then cycled the 5 hilly miles to the event.

This protest was the smallest of them all I had attended there, with only a little over a hundred protesters. Many of those present had themselves been held for some time in this or other detention centres.

Yarl’s Wood was being used to hold women and a few families, and previous protests had been widely supported by other groups including many feminist groups, who on this occasion stayed away. Later some other groups organised protests but on a smaller scale than the previous protests.

*and through a gate into the field next to the detention centre*

A woman who had been part of Movement for Justice and active in earlier protests here had left the group, complaining bitterly about the way the group had treated her. She had received widespread support including from some other former members leading to many boycotting this protest. I knew both her and others in MfJ and commented: “However justified her personal complaint, it revealed little if anything about the group that was not already public knowledge, and MfJ has played a major role in protests against our racist immigration detention system, and still seems to be supported by the former detainees.”

You can read about that public knowlege of MfJ on Wikipedia and on the complaints on the “Speak The Plain Truth” blog. I was saddened by the dispute but more so at the effect it had in weakening this and related campaigns – and I had never had any illusions about the nature of the organisation which I had first met in the 1990s.

*A woman looks out at the protesters who were obviously welcomed*

The protest followed the usual pattern, meeting on the public highway and, after a rally there marching a mile or so along a public footpath to a field next to the prison and overlooking a part of the site across a 20 foot high metal fence.

*Others hold messages in the windows which only open a narrow slit*

The lower 10ft of the fence is solid metal sheeting but the upper 10ft is a thick metal gauze (out of focus in the picture above.) Standing back on a slope I could see women held inside greeting the protesters. Guards inside had apparently tried to keep them away from the windows – even enticing them to another part of the building with offers of free ice-cream!

They could hear the protest and know that there were people outside who supported them, and some inside were able to speak to us over a mobile phone link. Some of those who spoke outside were able to greet friends still inside – some are held for long periods, with one released a day under three years.

*Mabel had spent 3 years inside and knew many of those still held there*

Most asylum seekers are genuine and are eventually released, but the Home Office has long appeared to have a policy of putting as many hurdles as possible in their way, often demanding records that are impossible for the detainees to provide – a similar tactic to that used in the Windrush scandal. Many were deported under illegal “fast-track” procedures – and MfJ has also managed to take legal action along with others to stop some individuals being deported.

*Between speeches many banged on the fence to make a great deal of noise*

Most of our legal system is based on the principle that people are innocent until they are tried and proven guilty. But our asylum system works in the opposite way, assuming claims are fraudulent and demanding that asylum seekers prove they are genuine.

It was hot in the sun and I got tired. The protest was still continuing as I got on my bike to ride back to Bedford station.

More pictures from Saturday 14th July 2018 at Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14.

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Barts NHS Cleaners march against Serco – 2017

Barts NHS Cleaners march against Serco: On Saturday 15th July 2017 a rally and march in Whitechapel follow five days of strike by cleaners and porters at the Royal London Hospital and the other East London hospitals in the Barts NHS Trust – Mile End Hospital, Newham University Hospital, St Bartholomew’s Hospital and Whipps Cross University Hospital.

Cleaning, portering, laundry, cleaning and security services were outsourced to Serco in 2017 and the workers involved immediately found their conditions being adversely affected. Serco’s first action was to write to them telling they were no longer allowed paid tea breaks; the workers sat in the canteen and refused to move before these were re-instated. But they accused Serco of increasing stress and workload with a climate of bullying, intimidation and fear and a failure to set up procedures for reporting problems with facilities and other issues.

When Serco refused a Unite claim for 30p per hour in line with inflation and cost of living increases in London the workers voted 99% in favour of strike action. Serco illegally brought in poorly trained agency workers to replace them and on the strike days conditions became unsanitary and many patients did not get hot meals.

Barts Trust had put these services out to tender to save money they needed to pay out £2.4million a week because of a disastrous PFI contract made under New Labour. Although It had provided a much-needed new hospital completed in 2016 but with two floors Barts didn’t have the money to fit out, it left them paying these huge sums long into the future. But Barts were attempting to save money at the expense of their workers and endangering patients.

The protest began on the busy street outside the old Royal London buildings but there were soon too many for the pavement here and we moved around to the side of the hospital for a rally, where speakers including Gail Cartmel of Unite, John McDonnell, then Shadow Chancellor and Unite pickets and other trade unionists including Victor Ramirez of United Voices of the World who spoke forcefully in Spanish – the first language of many of the cleaners – spoke from a balcony above the crowd – and I was able to take some pictures. Some brought greetings and support from other unions.

Serco employ mainly migrant workers in other public sector workplaces as well as running immigration prisons such as Yarl’s Wood where migrant women and families are daily repressed and subject to physical and sexual abuse and some had come to support the Barts workers and also to protest against their activities elsewhere.

Eventually the marchers formed up behind the banner and made there way along Mile End Road to another rally in a small park close to Mile End Hospital, where there were a few more speakers before we all dispersed.

Back in 2003 I’d spent time in several hospitals and had experienced a clear difference between the standards of cleaning and food between those with contracted out cleaners who were allowed insufficient time to clean the wards and one where the cleaners were still a part of the hospital team. It was the difference between dirt and used needles under my bed and a spotless shiny floor.

Protests continued at Barts and in 2023 Serco withdrew early from the contract. Both Unite and Unison claimed victory for the decision by Barts to directly employ the workers under the same conditions as other existing staff.

Labour in opposition were clearly opposed to outsourcing particularly in the public services and promising to outlaw it, but the Employment Rights Bill Implementation Roadmap published this month seems to have drawn back from the earlier promise and contains no explicit reference to outsourcing.

I was pleased with the photographs I had been able to make at the event and as well as the few here there are many more you can see on My London Diary at Barts NHS Cleaners march against Serco.

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Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 10 – 2016

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 10 – Yarl’s Wood, near Bedford

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood: On Saturday 3rd December almost 2000 protesters came to the isolated site on a former RAF base around 5 miles north of Bedford to take part in the 10th protest there organised by Movement for Justice calling for the closure of Yarl’s Wood and all immigration detention centres.

I’d taken three trains to get to Bedford Station where MfJ had arranged a coach for the journey on to the industrial estate on which the detention centre is hidden away. When we arrived the country back road was lined with coaches which had brought others from London and cities around the country.

But after a short rally there while we waited for others to arrive there was still over a mile along a public footpath to reach the field where the protest took place. This slopes up steeply a few feet from the 20 foot high metal prison fence, enabling protesters at the top of the slope th see the two upper floors of the detention centre – and for women at the windows in this to see them. Fortunately it had been relatively dry in the weeks before the event and for once the ground was not muddy and slippery.

Many other groups had come to join MfJ in the protest, including large numbers of students. MfJ had come mainly with migrants, many of whom had spent time in this and other immigration prisons, where this country locks up asylum seekers while slowly and inefficiently the Home Office deals with their cases.

Yarl’s Wood was mainly used for women, though there were a few families also locked up there. Many had fled violence, often sexual violence in their home countries and were then locked away here after arrival.

And they have no way to know when they might be released and are always under threat of being forcibly deported at short notice. One woman had then been held for over two years and was only released a day under three years. Most serve long indeterminate sentences in this and other immigration jails. They feel they are locked away, forgotten – and protests like this remind them that there are those outside who know and care about them.

The isolation means it is difficult for them to pursue their cases and to get the often ridiculous amounts of evidence the Home Office demands. But as they cannot leave the prisons they are allowed to have mobile phones and these enabled a few of the women inside to communicate with the protesters – and for their voices to be heard over the public address system brought by the campaigners.

All the women “speaking from inside thanked the protesters for coming and showing they had not been forgotten. They told of assaults and abuse by Serco security guards who today had locked many in other wings to stop them seeing the protest and threatened those who greeted the protesters and revealed there were cases of TB in the prison.”

Many of the protesters “who spoke at the protest had previously been held inside this and other immigration prisons, and encouraged those inside to keep fighting for justice.”

“As well as standing on the hill so that those on the upper floors allowed near the windows could see them and the banners and placards they held, others kicked and banged on the fence to make a noise that could be heard all over the jail – and indeed from the main raid half a mile away as I walked back to board my coach.“

Immigration detention continues to be used on an industrial scale in the UK, with 19,335 people entering detention in the year ending September 2024. Numbers decreased during Covid but have gone up to previous levels since. The UK is the only European country with no time limit on how long refugees can be held, and numbers held will be increased by the Illegal Immigration Act passed by the Tories in 2023 and the amendments made by Labour rapidly after they came to power in 2024.

The whole system of UK immigration is immoral and expensive, the result of successive governments shifting further to the right and appeasing the racist elements in the UK press. It has a corrosive effect on the mental health of those detained, in part because they are denied adequate health care.

More about the protest on December 3rd 2016 at Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 10.

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Shut down Yarl’s Wood Immigration Prison – 2017

Shut down Yarl’s Wood Immigration Prison: Saturday 13th May 2017 was the 11th protest outside Yarl’s Wood in the Movement for Justice campaign to shut down this and other immigration detention centres.

For once the weather was fine and there was little or no mud in the field facing the prison. And for some reason – perhaps the windows had been cleaned – we could see the detainees more clearly than on some previous occasions. And I seem to have written rather more clearly than on some occasions about the day – so here I’ll just reproduce the text from My London Diary, with a few of the pictures.

I’d caught the train from St Pancras to Bedford as usual, but instead of waiting for the MfJ bus had brought my Brompton, so could just jump on it and cycle towards Yarlswood. It was a ride of around 6 miles, mainly along side roads or on cycle paths beside busier roads, and it was a pleasant enough ride, though Yarl’s Wood is on a former airfield on a plateau rather higher than the city, and so it was uphill quite a lot of the way. And the climb up from the nearest village, Milton Ernest, was rather long and steep, though at least I didn’t have to bother about traffic, as the police had closed the road. But I was a little out of breath and tired as I arrived.

But Yarl’s Wood really is in the middle of nowhere, making those inside feel very isolated, and visits to them by anyone without a car are tedious and expensive for those on low income. So events like this are important in reminding those inside that they have not been forgotten.

There were several hundreds of people already at the roadside – and a long row of coaches that had brought them there, and there were speeches and chanting while they waited for others to arrive.

*Most of the detainees are women, but there are men in a family section of the prison*

From the road there is still a long walk along field edges following a public footpath, around three-quarters of a mile. Parts of this were heavy going on the Brompton, not designed for off-road use, and I did have to walk part of the way, as well as occasionally stopping to photograph the marchers, now around a thousand strong.

When the protesters arrived at the field in front of the tall fence around the centre, they were welcomed by shouts and waving from those imprisoned inside who held up messages calling for justice in the narrow slits the windows open. Only those who could get to the upper windows on the block facing the fence could see the protest, but others inside could certainly hear it.

There were speeches from former detainees, including several women who had been held at Yarl’s Wood, including Mabel Gawanas who was recently released a few days short of 3 years inside, and other former immigration detainees. People kicked on the fence to make a terrific racket and held up banners, posters and placards to show the detainees in what the protesters describe as as ‘racist, sexist hell-hole’ they have not been forgotten. Some inside spoke to the protest by mobile phone.

Some of the protesters climbed ladders to hold banners and placards above the first solid 10 feet of the 20 foot fence, while others had long poles or lit flares to make the protest more visible. A few yards back from the fence where the ground slopes up we could see those at the windows and photograph them through the mesh fence, though it wasn’t easy.

I left as the protest began to draw to a close, cycling back along the footpath to the road and then enjoying the long downhill stretch to the village and the main road. But I had to pay for this, as a short uphill modern stretch of road off stretched me almost to exhaustion. 40 metres doesn’t sound a lot, but feels in on a bike. And while the road up from Milton Ernest does the climb at a fairly sensible rate, Oakley Hill up from the A6 is at least twice as steep. I should have got off and walked, but pride doesn’t allow it unless it becomes really impossible. For some reason my three-speed gear had decided to be a two speed gear, but probably it wouldn’t have helped here as I think it was only the top gear I was missing – and I needed something considerably lower. But after than it was downhill most of the way to Bedford and a train probably an hour earlier than had I been on the bus.

More pictures at Shut down Yarl’s Wood Prison,

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Badgers, Yarls Wood & Ukraine – 2014

Badgers, Yarls Wood & Ukraine – Three protests in Westminster on Thursday 13 March 2014.

Badger Army Says End Culls – Old Palace Yard

Bovine TB is a great problem for dairy farmers and the great majority of them are convinced that badgers play an important role in spreading it, although scientists estimate that around 94% of all infections are spread from cow to cow. A major part of the problem is that the test used for the disease in cows fails to detect a large proportion – perhaps a third – of infected cows.

Around 20,000 cows are slaughtered each year because they are found to be infected and compensating the farmers costs us over £100 million a year. The Badger Trust argues in a report based on scientific evidence that a more effective approach than culling would be to focus on “cattle, cattle testing and vaccination and enhanced cattle biosecurity (including cattle movement).”

There is no scientific consensus that the killing of 260,000 badgers since 2013 has had any effect on the spread of the disease. DEFRA continues to support badger culling but Labour in 2023 pledged to end it if elected – though they have already drawn back from most of their pledges.

The cull has provoked strong emotions on both sides and this protest on a day when MPs were discussing the cull reflected that. You can read more about it and see more pictures on My London Diary at Badger Army Says End Culls.

End Persecution & Sexual Abuse at Yarl’s Wood – Home Office, Marsham St

A short walk away outside our “dysfunctional” and Home Office – then under Theresa May and her racist “hostile environment” policy – a protest called for an end to the psychological, sexual, physical and legal abuse of women asylum seekers and immigrants held at Yarl’s Wood and for the detention centre to be closed down.

Many women have made complaints of sexual abuse by male prison staff at the centre, and one who was awarded compensation was was horrified to learn that the man who abused her was still working there, free to commit further offences.

The protest took place following reports of the disappearance of a detainee called Saba from Pakistan, who women in Yarl’s Wood believe had committed suicide there. It was supported by the Movement for Justice, Southall Black Sisters and the All African Women’s Group, and protesters included women who had been held in the detention centre while their asylum claims were being considered.

In my account on My London Diary I give more details about her and also of the cases of a political refugee from Mali who had been illegally deported back there in the previous month, and a Kurdish trade union activist also illegally deported by the Home Office and then in hiding in Turkey where she had attempted suicide.

There had been many other reports of violence against women the centre, and the protest organisers stated:

“Yarl’s Wood women are fighting back against attempts to deport them or their sisters to persecution and death and exposing sexual abuse by male staff. The frightened response of the Home Office and its agents is to increase the repression in Yarl’s Wood, breaching even the present, inadequate legal rights of detainees and creating an environment that can drive women to suicide.”

The protest called for a public inquiry into abuses at Yarl’s Wood and for it to be shut down.

End Sexual Abuse at Yarl’s Wood

Ukraine Vigil – Downing St

Finally I went to Downing Street where on the pavement opposite Ukrainians had set up a permanent vigil, hoping to get the UK Government to stand up against Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea.

There wasn’t a great deal happening during my brief visit, and I was correct to think that the UK government would take anything but half-hearted action. To do more might hurt the City’s financial interests – and those of some leading Tory MPs and their family businesses. The failure of the west to end its aggressive Cold War attitudes to Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 was bound to have highly poisonous repercussions. We should have welcomed the country into our sphere and dismissed the NATO hawks.

A few more pictures at Ukraine Vigil.

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Shut Down Yarl’s Wood – 2016

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood – Saturday 12th March 2016 saw one of the largest protests outside the Immigration Detention Centre at Yarl’s Wood with well over a thousand people from around the country waving and shouting support to the women asylum seekers held indefinitely inside, who responded enthusiastically by shouting and waving back from the prison blocks behind the high fence, hindered by windows that hardly open. There were many among the protesters who had themselves been locked up in Yarls Wood or other detention centres.

My day began badly, with a cancelled train and then a coach driver for the five or six mile journey from Bedford Station to the isolated prison who got lost and took us for a 20 mile mystery tour through rural Bedfordshire, meaning we arrived rather late for the protest.

We arrived just in time for the final few minutes of the rally by Movement for Justice, the organisers of the protest, outside the locked gates of the Twinwoods Business Centre. An shortly after the protesters set off for the long march down the road and along a public footpath to a field on a slight rise adjoining the prison where the main protest was to take place.

It was dry and sunny, but there had been a week of rain and the fields we walked past were full of puddles and the rise in front of the 20 foot prison fence was extremely treacherous and hard to climb. Alongside the metal fence was a concrete path but then a few feet of churned up mud before the slippery slope.

At the bottom the lower 10ft of the fence is solid metal sheeting, so there you have no view of the prison. but can make a considerable noise by banging or kicking the fence. On top of the slope you can see the upper floors of the closest prison block, and from there we could make out those prisoners who had managed to get to the windows and were shouting greetings and some holding out notices though the small gap – just large enough for a hand to go through – that the windows open.

Unfortunately the windows reflect the sky and in the bright weather we could only see dimly those inside. Further along the rise we could see a little of the ground floor of the detention centre, and here the views were a little clearer. This part of the immigration prison was then being used for families, while the rest ws a women’s prison.

The regime in immigration detention differs from that in our other prisons and in one respect is worse. Those inside are held indefinitely and have no way of knowing when they might be released. And their detention can be very lengthy with one woman held there for three years less a couple of days. Many have seen this as totally unacceptable and called for a maximum length of detention of 28 days as is the case in some other countries.

But the detainees alhtough kept as prisoners are allowed to have mobile phones which they need to communicate with solicitors and others dealing with their immigration cases. And the protesters were able to phone some of the women inside and the calls could be linked to the public address system brought to the protest so they could tell something of their stories.

Those held in immigration detention are not criminals and few have or would commit any criminal offences. Many indeed have been victims of criminal attacks, violence and rape, or face these if they are deported back to their home countries. They all want to be allowed to live and work here, to contribute their skills to our country and pay our taxes. There is no need to keep them locked away. But we have a racist immigration regime that treats them as criminals and liars and shows little evidence of any humanity – but much of indifference, incompetence and unnecessary delays.

The goverment outsources their detention to private companies and various investigations and reports have shown the lack of care, mistreatment and even sexual harassment and violence in this and other centres. Rather than shutting them down and moving to a more humane system the government have now moved those who might otherwise been in Yarl’s Wood to a far more remote location to make protests harder to organise.

The pictures and text, including some captions, on My London Diary tell more about what what happened at the protest: Shut Down Yarl’s Wood.

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Blizzard, Education and Hunger Strike – 2018

Blizzard, Education and Hunger Strike – London hasn’t had a great deal of snow for some years, but when I got off the bus on Wednesday 28th February 2018 close to London University I found myself walking into a blizzard. There was a couple of inches of snow underfoot and the biting wind was driving dense snowflakes into my face making it both difficult to walk and hard to see where I was going.

I slipped a few times and almost fell as I walked through Byng Place, only just managing to stop myself and my camera bag falling into the snow, and for the first 15 or 20 minutes after I reached the meeting point for the march it was difficult to take pictures, with snowflakes landing on the lens surface as soon as I took away the cloth I had stuffed against it inside the lens hood and raised the camera to my eye.

Most of the pictures from the start of the protest were ruined by snow on the lens making some areas soft and diffuse. It might sometimes have been an arty effect but wasn’t what I wanted. Fortunately after a while the snow died down and I was able to work more normally, though the occasional flake kept coming and there were a few thick flurries later on the march.

HE and FE march for pensions and jobs

The UCU was on the fifth day of a strike to try and get the universities to talk with them about pay and pensions. On this march to a rally in Methodist Central Hall in Westminster, close to the Houses of Parliament, they were joined by staff from London FE colleges on the first day of a two-day strike over pay and conditions. And plenty of their students had come along to show their support.

Although students are now paying high fees for their university courses, the pay of university teachers has not benefited from this, and has not kept up with inflation. Much more teaching at universities is also being done by graduate students and others on part-time or often zero hours contracts.

What particularly inflamed the situation was the intention of the universities to end the long-established pension scheme, replacing it with one that would greatly reduce pensions, and their refusal to discuss this with their union, the UCU.

The 5 day strike was supported overwhelmingly by UCU members and had shut down 61 UK universities, despite draconian threats by the management at some of them such as Royal Holloway (RHUL). Pickets had stood in the freezing weather and few people had crossed the picket line.

The move away from the pension scheme was largely driven by a small number of universities, particularly the Oxbridge colleges. Many of these are extremely wealthy, some owning huge areas of land including large parts of London and having vast reserves, not least in their wine cellars. A number of college principals had given their support to the union.

The dispute between the employers and the UCU continued for five years and was only ended in October 2023 when the employer body UUK made an offer of full restoration. This came after 69 days of strikes by the UCU and was a historic victory for UCU members and reversed further cuts made in 2022.

University teachers continue to fight for better pay, more appropriate workloads and job security. FE teachers, marching because of the loss of 15,000 jobs in the sector particularly as adult education has been savaged by austerity, and whose wages had been cut by 21% since 2009, continue to be treated unfairly.

I went into the rally in Central Hall largely to try to get warm after the freezing march, and was fortunate to arrive early enough to get inside – many of the marchers were left outside the the cold where the speakers went outside to speak after making their contributions in the hall.

The event was running late because of the larger than expected number of people on the march, and by the time the main speakers, John McDonnell and Frances O’Grady had performed I’d missed the time for another event I’d planned to cover, the handing in of some NHS petitions at the Department of Health. I But I was pleased to be able to stay longer in the warm.

HE & FE rally for pensions and jobs
HE and FE march for pensions and jobs

Solidarity with Yarl’s Wood hunger strikers – Home Office

I left the Methodist Central Hall and walked down to the Home Office where an emergency protest was taking place to support the hunger strike and refusal to work by the 120 women and a few men in immigration detention at Yarl’s Wood.

They had begun their action a week earlier to demand the Home Office respect the European Convention of Human Rights and end the separation of families, end indefinite detention with a 28 day maximum detention period, end charter flights which deport people without notice, and end the re-detention of those released from detention.

Their statement also called for an amnesty for those who have been in the UK for more than ten years and for the Home Office to stop deporting people before cases and appeals have been completed, as well as making full disclosure of all evidence to immigration tribunals.

They called for those in detention centres to be treated with dignity and respect and be given proper health care and an end to the detention of highly vulnerable people. They also want an end to employment in detention centres at ‘prison wages’ of £1 an hour.

Among the groups supporting the protest were the Movement for Justice, All African Women’s Group, Queer Strike and No Borders. Some of those taking part in the protest had previously served time in detention centres and knew first hand about the shameful way the UK treats them and some spoke at the event and several of those taking part in the hunger strike were able to speak to the protest from inside Yarls Wood by mobile phone.

Solidarity with Yarl’s Wood hunger strikers

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Movement For Justice at Yarls Wood – 2015

Movement For Justice at Yarls Wood – On Saturday 7th November 2015 Movement for Justice organised a large protest with other groups to show solidarity with the women locked up inside Yarl’s Wood immigration detention centre and to demand that all such detention prisons be shut down.

MFJ Meet To March to Yarl’s Wood – Twinwoods Business Park

Yarl’s Wood was built on a former wartime airfield in remote countryside five or six miles from the centre of Bedford, perhaps chosen in part for its remoteness, which makes it difficult for visitors or protesters to get there.

But Movement for Justice – MfJ – and others had organised coaches from around the country, including eight from London as well as one from Bedford Station to bring people with others arriving by car, taxi or bicycle. The road leading to the prison is private, but people were able to meet on a public road around a mile away outside the main entrance to the business park there.

While we were waiting for everyone to arrive there was lively rally with a great deal of dancing, singing and chanting, keeping everyone’s spirits high, and keeping us warm as a chilly wind with occasional spots of rain swept across the open site on top of a high plateau.

Among those at the protest were many immigrants who had themselves been detained at this or other detention centres around the country while waiting for a decision to be taken on their asylum claims. Sometimes this takes several years and those who are taken to prisons such as these are held indefinitely, never knowing if or when they will be released or taken under guard to be forcibly deported.

Many inside have fled their countries after violent attacks including sexual assault and rape and deserve humane treatment not imprisonment. Few if any pose any real threat and could be housed outside, often with friends or relatives in this country. If they were allowed to work many would make a positive contribution. They would also be much more able to contact their solicitors and collect information to support their asylum cases than from inside the detention centres where access is limited.

Instead the Home Office locks them away and sometimes seems to have forgotten them and lost the key. One woman was detained for a couple of days less than three years before being released – after which she returned with the MfJ and spoke at protests which give those still inside some hope and remind them that they have not entirely been forgotten.

More at MFJ Meet Outside Yarl’s Wood.

MfJ ‘Set Her Free’ protest at Yarl’s Wood

As well as MfJ, Sisters Uncut, Lesbians & Gays support the Migrants, All Africans Women’s Groups, Glasgow Unity and others had come to join in the protest. Eventually with around a thousand people gathered it was time to march, though a few coaches had not yet arrived.

We set off on the long walk to the detention centre, with banners and placards, a short distance along the road and then down the public footpath which runs through a couple of fields and across another track, and into a field on the north side of the prison, about a mile from where the campaigners had gathered.

Here there was a fairly steep rise a few feet up a hill from the 20 foot high fence around the detention centre and from the top of this we could see the upper floor windows, some of which had women at them, though only through the dense thick wire grid of the upper half of the fence.

The windows do not have bars, but only open a few inches, but this was enough for the women inside to put their hands through and hold towels and clothing to greet the protesters. Some managed to hold out messages: one read ‘We came to seek Refuge. Not to be locked up’ and another ‘We are from torture. We Need Freedom’.

The lower 10 feet of the fence is made of stout metal panels, and beating or kicking on these makes a very loud noise. Later some protesters brought up rope ladders so they could hold placards and banners on the more open top of the fence so they could be seen by the women inside.

The prisoners are allowed to have phones which they need to contact their solicitors and advisers over their cases and some were able to use these to communicate with the protesters and to have their voices relayed over the PA system the protesters had brought.

There was a heavy rain shower during the protest, and the ground which was already muddy and with large puddles became very treacherous and getting up from the concrete and narrow flat area at the bottom of the fence became difficult. But soon the sun was back out again.

Most of those who spoke at the event were former detainees, some of whom had friends who were still inside the immigration prison.

The protest was still continuing when I had to leave and the low winter sun was beginning to make photography more difficult. It seemed a long and rather lonely journed as I made my way back to the road, boots heavy with mud. But I was free to go, while women who had come to this country seeking asylum from danger and violence in their own countries were still locked up by a hostile and unfeeling government.

More at MfJ ‘Set Her Free’ protest at Yarl’s Wood.

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14

Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14: This protest on Saturday 21st July 2018 was the 14th organised by Movement for Justice outside the immigration prison at Yarl’s Wood and I think their last there. I missed the first so this was my 13th visit to this remote location, cyling uphill the five or six miles north from Bedford station. I had previously photographed a number of protests organised by MfJ outside the two immigration prisons (officially called detention centres to make it sound nicer) on the north of Heathrow airport, Harmondsworth and Colnbrook, a rather easier journey.

Unlike these two prisons which housed men, Yarl’s Wood was mainly used to hold women, though there were also a few families there. The protests there had attracted more campaigners because of this, with women being seen more widely as victims than male asylum seekers. And many of those who were locked up inside were women who had been raped as well as beaten and otherwise subjected to traumatic events before fleeing their countries.

Many of the women – as too the men elsewhere – were kept locked up for many months and some for years in indefinite detention while the Home Office refused to believe their stories or to properly investigate their cases, often demanding paperwork it would be impossible for them to provide. The remoteness of the centre and only limited access to internet and telephones makes it difficult for the women to progress their cases.

Many of these are people with desperate needs for counselling and help, but instead as various investigations, official as well as undercover journalism – had shown are held under appalling conditions in this and other centres run by private companies such as SERCO, with detainees refused their human and civil rights, assaulted, sexually harassed and assaulted, denied proper medical treatment, poorly fed and forced to work for £1 an hour on menial tasks.

The protests here are greeted by the women, giving them the assurance that they have not been forgotten and that there are those outside who support them. Those able to get to the windows facing the hill on which the protesters stood so they could be seen over the tall prison fence – the lower 10ft solid steel and above that another ten foot of dense metal mesh – shouted greetings, waved and held up messages.

A powerful public address system meant those inside could hear the speeches, some by former inmates of Yarl’s Wood and other detention centres, and some by those inside, relayed by mobile phone to the amplifier, as well as by some leading MfJ members.

Most of those inside will eventually be released, the majority getting leave to stay in this country. Some are taken to be deported with the MfJ and other organisations then working desperately and often successfully to stop their deportation flights back to terror and violence in their home countries.

This was by far the smallest of all the protests at Yarl’s Wood organised by the MfJ, following complaints made against the organisation by a former member who appears to have been treated badly by them. But however justified her personal complaint, her comments revealed little or nothing about the nature of the group which was not already on Wikipedia or otherwise common knowledge. But the dispute led to many other groups ending their support for protests organised by the MfJ, some organising their own protests but with very limited success.

*Mabel had been held in Yarl’s Wood for a day or two less than 3 years*

Other groups were and are working – as MfJ still is – to support detainees. The MfJ has played a major role in protests against our racist immigration detention system and in actions to prevent deportations. It still seems to be supported by many former detainees who have always played a leading role in the protests both at Yarl’s Wood and at Harmondsworth.

The Home Office finally decided it was too easy for protests to be organised outside Yarl’s Wood and moved the women – many of whom were released at the start of the Covid epidemic – up to an even more remote location in the north-east, with Yarl’s Wood being used to house those who had crossed the Channel in small boats.

The Illegal Immigration Act finally passed a few days ago intends to deport almost all migrants and asylum seekers (other than those coming under special schemes for Ukraine, Hong Kong etc) to Rwanda without any consideration of their asylum claims. Efforts to persuade the government to set up safe routes for those claiming asylum were rejected by the government in the latest ratcheting up of its racist policies, justified by them through the doublespeak of “compassion” while showing not the faintest scintilla of any real compassion.

More on My London Diary at Shut Down Yarl’s Wood 14.