Barbed Wire Britain
Ten minutes outside of central Oxford, 184 people are currently being held in Campsfield House Detention Centre. Do not let the term 'house' deceive you - this is a prison; the security fences allude to that, not to mention the interrogation that I was subject to when simply looking around the edge of the site.
The people being detained have committed no crime. They have been given no sentence and will have no trial. They are held indefinitely without access to legal representation. Why are they there? Because they are waiting for their application for asylum to be processed.
When it was converted from a young offenders institution in 1993, Campsfield House became the first major detention centre in Britain. It is now run by a private company, Group Four, which is contracted to the Home Office. Since its establishment, it has been the target of many protests and campaign groups. In 1994 Campsfield came under the national media spotlight, as detainees staged one of the biggest hunger strikes that this country has ever seen. Throughout its 11-year history, riots and suicide attempts have been common.
In November of 2002, the Home Secretary David Blunkett, announced that Campsfield would be closed by 2004, as it was an institution that was "inappropriate for the 21st century." However, just two months later, Beverly Hughes announced a spectacular government U-turn - stating not just that Campsfield would remain open, but that the number of detainees held at the centre would be substantially increased. Despite provoking appeals from many Oxford City councillors and politicians - particularly those within the Labour Party itself - the decision was not overturned.
The 'One Life' week that has just been organised by OUSU was intended to celebrate the diversity of our community. Yet far from celebrating, the recent 'Asylum Debate' made it clear that there needs to be much greater awareness of this 'diversity', in all its ugly forms, before we can dance around like naïve happy-clappers singing about how great and diverse we all are. Of course there are things that we can celebrate - no one could deny that - especially the genuine cultural diversity and acceptance that is a real feature of Oxford and its students; but when it comes to the asylum issue, we should make an effort to think more seriously about the realities - Campsfield House is not an abstract, detached problem, it's on our doorstep.
One of the speakers at the One Life debate was a representative of the 'Close Campsfield' campaign group. This organisation has been arranging regular protests outside Campsfield for ten years, claiming it to be an institution that grossly violates the basic human rights of the detainees. They go to Campsfield on the last Saturday of every month and shout messages of support to the detainees in the exercise yard. It is a well-intentioned group, demonstrating for a noble cause. However - noble as its claims are - like many overt activist groups, it tends to shoot itself in the foot by being over-zealous in its arguments.
The basic question is whether it is right to detain people in these conditions until they are deemed legitimate refugees, and, if it is not, what alternative method should be employed. The Close Campsfield group's views are very strong on the former issue, but weak on the latter - and whilst the emotive examples that are wheeled out in their arguments are indeed persuasive, with further research a number transpire to be slightly exaggerated. For example, Close Campsfield claims that families within the centre are separated intentionally, when in reality there are no families in Campsfield. They also claim that detainees are prevented from seeing newspapers and TV news, but (according to the Group Four press office) this is absolutely untrue.
The only alternative to government policy that the Close Campsfield representative could offer was an "open borders" Europe. This must surely be seen as far too idealistic in a world where border control is often the only safe gaurd against terrorism. Furthermore, while their criticism of the editors of newspapers such as The Daily Mail, The Daily Express and The Sun is fully justified - and would gain the support of any level-headed British citizen - they tarnish this argument somewhat by deeming all readers of such papers as "racists".
Whilst readers may well be ignorant of the realities, and the content of these papers may well incite racist sentiment (the claim that their editors "should all be locked up" might seem acceptable to many of us), to label the entire reader base as "racist" serves to set the Close Campsfield movement up for ridicule. By throwing the word around so loosely, they are wrongly putting themselves on a level playing field with groups like the BNP, who seem to use the term "illegal immigrant" for any person who is not white.
The BNP's ridiculous approach simplifies the problem with total disregard for the real complexities of the situation. They claim that only ten per cent of people coming to this country for asylum are genuine. But this is simply a perversion of the statistic showing that only ten per cent of first applications are approved - they ignore the fact that after appeal this percentage goes up to 50 per cent.
The figures are cited completely out of context. Furthermore, the most recent BNP claim has been that Blair is "encouraging" asylum seekers to come to Britain (a claim that is laughable in itself when you see places like Campsfield) as a means of securing their votes in the next election, which they believe he will lose unless he ships in the support of asylum seekers.
This is ridiculous. For a start, even if they are granted permission to live in Britain (and not part of the 50 per cent who are immediately deported), asylum seekers have no rights to involvement in the democratic process. They are given only 70 per cent of the minimum state benefits that full citizens are entitled to, and the benefits that they do receive are in voucher form, not cash. The asylum issue is being debated in an extreme and exaggerated climate.
Dan Paskins, both a VP of OUSU and a Labour councillor in Oxford, made perhaps the most relevant point: "No matter whether you are for or against places like Campsfield, the key thing that everyone must recognise is that the current system is not working." This holds a lot of weight.
If we are to deal with the process of asylum in this country, we should really understand the parameters of the debate properly. Britain's immigration levels are by no means the highest in Europe - we rank around the middle of the scale. Asylum seekers are not just millions of greedy foreigners wanting to take our taxes, but around 10,000 people entering the country per year, mostly from regions torn apart by war.
If it was simply the fact, as the BNP likes to argue, that everyone in the world wants a bit of our cake, you would expect the poor of the world to be coming equally from every country, but this is not the case.
The frenzy of the asylum debate, which is fired up without remorse by newspapers such as the Daily Mail, has made the term "asylum seeker" pejorative. But, if we actually think about what the term means, this should not be the case.
The real point is that there is a lack of clear alternatives to the objectionable current system.
Until a credible solution can be found, Campsfield will still sit on the edge of Oxford, holding people who have come to this country for our help, in conditions which may be worse than the ones that prompted them to leave their homes in the first place.
27th May 2004