Detention They call it detention, but it’s hell. We are treated as criminals, when we haven't committed any crime. Some are mothers whose children are detained as well. Male security officers have access to women's rooms. Women are given medication and they do not know what they are being given or why – some have reported being drugged to stop them protesting their treatment and conditions; food is disgusting, often tinned or unfamiliar. There is no privacy; security guards know all about our cases. Even outside detention, we live in constant fear of being held in police cells without anyone knowing, if we have to sign on regularly at police stations. An Asian woman under threat of deportation who later won the right to stay, describes conditions in Campsfield Detention Centre: I was arrested and put inside – all because I left a violent man. I was separated from my child; children are very deeply affected when taken from their mothers in this way. They tried to put him into social services’ care which would have had a terrible effect on him. Most of the women inside are Black; many are African and Kurdish women; many are mothers. Women seeking asylum in Britain are arrested at the airport and taken straight to detention. Often they don’t know anyone here, are isolated, depressed and ashamed to tell anyone they are in detention. The food is very bad, the conditions unsanitary; sometimes there is only cold water for showers and nothing is done to fix it for days. You’re expected to wash in cold water, or not at all. On arrival, women are brought from the airport very late, and taken back there very early, not giving them time to get help from others in detention. You are locked up just before being deported so you can’t let anyone know what's happening. Most people are detained a long time because of poor legal advice; many have had to change solicitors as often as four times because their representatives do little or nothing to make the case for coming out. Some are more interested in legal fees than the details of the case. It is very difficult to get good legal advice from inside detention. If women resist deportation, we are brutalised, handcuffed, dragged, sat on, even smothered. Several women have been killed by immigration officers during deportation; Joy Gardner in England and Semira Adamu in Belgium are just two women we know about. Black, Immigrant and Refugee women's survival and Justice Work Asylum from Rape and Other Violence The Global Women's Strike Demands Payment for all caring work; pay equity for all, women and men; paid maternity leave, breastfeeding breaks and other benefits; abolition of Third World debt; accessible clean water and non-polluting technology; healthcare, housing, transport; protection and asylum from all violence and persecution; freedom of movement. Click here for the full list of demands You can contact us at: Black Women for Wages for Housework |