__The following is a submission to the Joint Committee on Human Rights regarding their inquiry into control orders.__
We welcome your inquiry into powers to impose control orders.
By way of background to our submission, our campaign was set up in early 2001 to oppose
the Terrorism Act 2000. We are a non-party organisation supported by a number of lawyers,
advocates for refugee and migrant communities,and civil liberties campaigners. We opposed
the 2000 Act and subsequent anti-terrorism legislation of 2001 and 2005 on several grounds,
as argued in documents which can be seen on our web site, www.campacc.org.uk . Of
particular relevance to the current submission, we opposed internment powers under the
Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act, and later the power to impose control orders, as
well as the current proposal for extending the maximum detention period without charge.
Our campaign links human rights campaigners with people targeted by the anti-terror powers
and provides practical support for them, e.g. protest events, letters, bail surety and home
visits to persons under control orders. From that experience we have special expertise in the
human effects of anti-terror powers, as well as insights into how they are used.
By a coincidence of timing, your deadline comes a day after publication of Lord Carliles
report on control orders. His report warrants at least a brief comment,as a contrast to our
submission. Overall his report reinforces the emergency mentality by which the government
warns about further suicide bombings, labels individuals as terror suspects and so justifies
the use of control orders − with no need for evidence in court. He asks that police chiefs
should explain why there is not enough evidence for prosecutions rather than ask the
government to demonstrate why control orders are necessary to protect the public from
violence. Lord Carlile acknowledges concerns about potential psychological effects of
control orders, and about family and other arrangements for the suspects. He suggests the
restrictions have been extremely restrictive and close to what would need an opt-out from
European human rights laws. As we will argue, his euphemisms sanitise gross abuses of
human rights − indeed, punishment without trial − and downplays a great inconsistency with
the ECHR.
When the governments proposal for control orders was going through Parliament about a
year ago, CAMPACC denounced this new power to impose punishment on those not proven
guilty. As we further said:-
Under the Home Secretarys proposals, people could be subject to a civil control order without
any criminal charge. They would not necessarily be told of the evidence against them. Like the
internment power which the Law Lords have rejected, such orders impose punishment without
conviction through a proper jury trial. This would violate a fundamental principle of justice; the
right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. Such powers would impose a criminal-type
sentence without trial, in the name of preventing hypothetical crimes (CAMPACC statement,7
February 2005).
Our ominous prediction has been more than vindicated in practice, for the following reasons:
Control orders have been used to isolate individuals and their families, including
children, from the wider society, even from friends or relatives. In some cases, detainees relatives have not been given permission to visit even several months after
applying. The punishment without trial extends to wives and children, and even to
those providing accommodation, since visitors to the whole household are restricted by
Home Office vetting arrangements. This is a form of collective punishment which
violates natural justice and international law.
Considerable mental distress has been caused by the requirement that the detainees
accommodation can be searched by the police, or by a monitoring company checking
tagging apparatus, at any time. Distress to the entire family is apparent in the testimony
of Mahmoud Abu Rideh to journalists. For example, My kids worry that when they
get back from school I will be gone and they might not find me again. My wife cant
sleep. She is asking me not to go out again (Control order flaws exposed, The
Guardian, 24 March 2005). A month later he visited a police station, asking for a
return to prison custody rather than having an electronic tag re-fitted (Tagged terror
suspect sent back to jail, The Guardian, 29 April 2005; copies to be included with our
letter). Similar distress is documented in a statement from the bail-accommodation
provider for Mr S (Appendix A). Likewise the distress and social isolation of an entire
family as well as the person put under restrictions (Appendix B).
Anyone applying for permission to host or visit individuals under control orders − as
well as some persons detained and bailed under the 1971 Immigration Act − is
officially classified as a known associate of a terror suspect (Independent, 15
December 2005, pp.1-2, copy to be posted with our letter). As volunteers to visit and
support people who are victims of a law we oppose, we proudly defy that ridiculous
stigma. But many other people are intimidated, especially friends or relatives who do
not hold UK citizenship and so rightly feel more vulnerable to persecution. All this
illustrates the more general role of anti-terror laws in terrorising Muslim and migrant
communities.
Although your committees investigation presently concerns only control orders, the 1971
Immigration Act has been used for similar purposes. That is, certain Immigration Act
detainees have been bailed under conditions similar to control orders or even under greater
restrictions. As we detail below, in effect it has been used to create a parallel regime to that
of control orders. Under their bail conditions, for example, they must speak to no one who
has not been authorised by the Home Office. Some even undergo full house arrest, which
should require a `derogation from Article 5 of the ECHR unless it can be shown that
deportation will take place within a reasonable period. Bail has been granted precisely
because it seems doubtful that this is the case. Whatever changes may be made to the control
orders regime, those changes (hopefully, improvements) will not touch the parallel regime
under the 1971 Immigration Act, which remains.
Regardless of which law is used to impose special conditions, they may amount to virtual
house arrest. In this way the government in effect re-creates internment, pending a judicial
process which could last for many years.
Moreover, they create a domestic prison for anyone who acts as a host, e.g.the persons
family, friend or volunteer (e.g.supporters of our campaign). All such people are subject to
impromptu searches and removal of property including computers. The household is
prohibited from having visitors not approved by the Home Office. All this amounts to
punishment without trial for the host, as well as for the person directly under restrictions. Thus the government extends punishment to the detainees associates. In this way, the
system deters people from acting as host and so makes bail more difficult to obtain.
Those patterns illustrate how the government is using a variety of powers to circumvent
normal judicial procedures, even to circumvent the Law Lords ruling that internment
violated the ECHR. According to the governments own account of the Prevention of
Terrorism Act 2005, no derogation from the ECHR would be necessary unless control orders
impose house arrest. Yet in practice it has imposed virtual house arrest without the overt
shame or burden of such derogation (see Appendix C).
*Impracticability of control order regimes for single men using rented accommodation*
Lastly, the viability of control orders as an alternative to the (completely unacceptable)
practice of internment depends on it being practical for persons subject to these orders to live
in the community outside of prison. This is not the case for control orders, nor for the
parallel regime under the Immigration Act 1971 (see Appendix C). These regimes have been
operated in such a way as to make it impractical to expect detainees without families and
family homes to be released from prison or detention centres to live under control orders,
even where their house arrest is only partial. If detainees friends, supporters and lawyers try
to rent them a self-contained flat which can be proposed as bail accommodation, the need for
access and equipment installations by the tagging company makes landlords unwilling to let,
especially if informed by the police of the nature of their proposed tenant. If accommodation
with a resident landlord is proposed, then the conditions of life for the host are made
impossible. The host may not receive his or her friends as visitors, since they are not vetted
to visit the detainee, and must accept searches and inspections by the tagging company and
police at any time. These issues mean that finding accommodation where the conditions of a
control order can be met is extraordinarily difficult for single detainees, so that there is
nowhere they can stay outside of a prison. For this reason alone, the regime of both control
orders and the parallel regime of bail under the 1971 Act needs to be made less strict, even
if it were not for the overwhelming concerns about the injustice and inhumanity of any
system of punishment without trial.
*Conclusion*
Drawing on our direct experience, this letter has outlined gross abuses of human rights under
both the PTA 2005 and the Immigration Act 1971. Do these practices conform to the
intention of Parliament when enacting those laws? Do these practices comply with human
rights law, especially the ECHR? We urge your committee to investigate those abuses.
Our supporters would be pleased to send further information or to present oral evidence at
any hearings.
Estella Schmid
On behalf of
Campaign Against Criminalising Communities (CAMPACC)
*Appendix A: Mr Qavi s personal account as a bail-accommodation provider*
I came in contact with Mr S for the first time, on 19th April, 2005, when, before Asylum and
Immigration Tribunal, I undertook to provide a bail address for him. He stayed with me in
my flat for about 4 weeks, after which he moved to a NASS-provided accommodation
elsewhere.
On the morning of 15th September 2005 he was, in a highly publicised raid, arrested and
taken to Long Lartin. He was ordered released by SIAC [Special Immigration Appeals
Commission ] on 17th January, 2006 on bail conditions which are more restrictive than the
control orders system. The bail conditions of his release oblige Mr S to wear a tag at
all times, to report to the police station every day between 12 noon to 2 pm, not to leave the
bail address at all times save for the period from 10.00 am to 4.00 pm etc. His movements
are restricted to a marked area which he is required not to leave. He is forbidden to receive
any visitor other than his solicitor while staying at my place. The police and Immigration
personnel and others working on behalf of Home Secretary can call at any time and without
prior notice to enter the bail residence to check on him.
I offered to stand surety and provide him a bail address early in December 2005. On this
occasion, the Home Office chose to impose "surety conditions" in drips, seemingly designed
to prolong the process and to dissuade me from providing a bail address by sheer
unreasonableness of the conditions they initially sought to impose. The result being that Mr
S's release on bail was delayed for weeks.
The "surety conditions" require me not to permit my friends, neighbours and acquaintances
to enter my residence unless I provide the visitor's name, address, date of birth and a
photograph at least 3 days beforehand to the Home Office and seek its approval as to the
time and date and the expected duration of the visit. My lap top can be inspected and taken
away for up to 48 hours. My residence can be entered by police and immigration officials at
any time without prior notice,etc.
The "surety conditions"are grossly restrictive and infringe
on my civil liberties as a British citizen. I have been obliged to place myself and my
residence under quarantine in order to seek the release of a friendless, young asylum seeker
from unjust and unlawful imprisonment.
Since 17th January 2006 my home has been visited by various police and immigration people
on three difference occasions - all without notice and at abrupt hours of their choosing. The
last visit took place on Saturday 28th January 2006 when 3 officials called at 6.30 pm, just as
I had sat down with my newspaper. They wanted to check the tagging equipment. For the
next 50 minutes they wandered around all over my place in their unclean shoes, checking
each and every corner over and over again. They tacked a lead of wire to one of the door
frames and fixed a portable antenna for their equipment to the top of the door. A hideous
sight which none of the "surety conditions" say they are allowed to do.
At odd hours and for no discernable reason, the tagging company telephones to enquire of
Mr S where he was 3 minutes or 7 minutes ago. At other times, the tagging company rings
and when Mr S picks up the telephone, there is no one on the line. When he calls back to ask
why the telephone rang, he is told we did not call you. All this is happening in my presence
and within my hearing.
During 4 months of incarceration, Mr S has lost some 20 kg in weight and looks a shadow of
himself. He is psychologically traumatised by the circumstances of his arrest on 15th September, 2005 when his front door was smashed and he was severely beaten up by
immigration and police personnel. He carries injuries to his knee and leg which require
medical attention.
*Appendix B: Les Levidow s account as a visitor*
When the solicitors Birnberg Peirce requested volunteers to visit individuals put under
control orders in spring 2005, I responded as a supporter of CAMPACC. Previously I had no
personal contact with such individuals, though I had actively campaigned for their release
from unjust detention. On my behalf, Birnberg Peirce applied to the Home Office for
permission for me to visit such individuals. By the time I was assigned to one, Mr G, he had
been re-arrested for deportation to Algeria and then placed under house arrest under the
Immigration Act 1971.
Mr G was released from prison on the basis that he had a family here who could host him.
His house has been effectively turned into a domestic prison, in many ways. Guests are
prohibited unless approved by the Home Office. It still had not given approval to some
friends and relatives, many months after they submitted a request. Great distress results from
the family s isolation, as well as from the constant apprehension about police raids, about
security companies checking the electronic tag, etc. The latter seems all the more absurd,
given that Mr G remains bound to a wheelchair, physically unable to move around without it.
When I have visited Mr G,he and his family were very appreciative because human rights
campaigners have become an important contact with the outside world. He explained to me
the difficulty of his bail conditions, which prohibit any conversation with anyone not
approved by the Home Office. Eventually the judge allowed him to go out to his back
garden for a couple of hours per day, but Mr G decided not to take up this opportunity.
Why? Probably neighbours in his housing co-operative would say hello. As a human being,
Mr G would find it unbearable to ignore them. If he simply says hello, then he could be
returned to prison for breaking his bail conditions. The dilemma well illustrates how these
conditions abuse human rights, as well as serving a political agenda of social isolation.
As I eventually learned from a newspaper article, when someone applies to the Home Office
for permission to visit such a person, s/he classified as a known associate of a terror suspect
(Independent ,15 December 2005,pp.1-2). Such a stigma is a primary political purpose of
the anti-terror laws. It effectively deters many people from such association.
*Appendix C: The parallel regime of control-order style bail conditions under the
Immigration Act 1971*
This issue has emerged in relation to some immigration detainees whom the government
wants to deport to Algeria, Libya and Jordan. These are countries notorious for torture, with
which the government has been seeking `no-torture agreements for some time. Some
individuals released from ACTSA internment to a control orders regime under the PTA 2005
were re-detained in prison under the Immigration Act 1971 in August 2005, apparently
because it was thought that such agreements would soon be concluded and the government
then intended to deport them. Other individuals who had been accused, but not convicted of
terrorism, in the well-known ricin trial and released as innocent men in spring 2005 were
also re-detained in August-September under the Immigration Act 1971.
When it became apparent that deportation would not be imminent because the agreements
with other governments had not yet been concluded, bail was granted to a few such people.
This immigration bail has been under conditions even stricter than those previously used or
envisaged under control orders. Four such cases were featured in an excellent article in The
Independent (15 December,pages 1-2). In one of these cases, which may not be the only
one, the detainee is not permitted to leave his accommodation at all, yet no derogation from
Article 5 of the ECHR has been sought from Parliament as laid down as necessary for those
control orders under the PTA 2005 which constitute full house arrest. Our supporters have
direct experience of hosting or visiting some of these individuals (see Appendix B).
When responding to the Law Lords ruling on internment under the ATCSA 2001,
Parliament sought an alternative which did not breach the ECHR. The spirit of their
judgement, which should surely be reflected in all subsequent treatment of terror suspects,
was that imprisonment without trial or charge is simply unacceptable. However, the scope of
their judgement related to people with a right to reside in the UK or those who could not be
deported due to a risk that they would be tortured if returned to their country of origin. Since
the summer of 2005, we have seen the emergence of a parallel regime of internment under
the Immigration Act 1971, using the excuse that those affected are being detained pending
deportation. At least one person (Detainee G) who was first interned under ATCSA 2001,
then released under a control order, then re-arrested and detained in prison under the
Immigration Act 1971, has now been bailed under complete house arrest under that Act.
Full house arrest under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 requires a decision to derogate
from the ECHR, justified by a `national emergency, yet this parallel regime somehow
escapes that requirement; no such derogation has been made or sought. The justification for
house arrest or detention without trial or charge under the Immigration Act 1971 is
apparently that deportation is imminent. Yet when G was placed under a control order, it was
precisely because he could __not__ be deported due to the risk of torture. Nothing had changed
with regard to that question by the time he was re-arrested in August 2005 (with others in
somewhat similar circumstances,of whom more shortly). The UK government had merely
decided to negotiate with the Algerian government with a view to obtaining assurances that
returned persons would not be tortured. Here lies an important legal issue: whether someone
can be regarded as detained pending deportation when the agreement that is supposed to
make that deportation acceptable under Article 3 of the ECHR as a procedure for a whole
category of persons has not yet been tried and tested in the UK courts. It is illogical to
maintain that G s situation changed because a no torture agreement was __under negotiation__.
This argument is quite separate from our considerable scepticism that the Algerian
governments undertakings can be trusted.
A similar but slightly different argument can be applied to those who were re-arrested in
August under the Immigration Act 1971 having been acquitted (or had charges against them
dropped)in the so-called ricin trial. These men are still in Immigration Act detention or
have been bailed under partial house arrest. These are innocent men; to deny this would be to
reject the outcome of the normal and proper judicial procedure which they went through. Nor
was any new evidence put forward against them, nor were they subjected to control orders
under the procedure that Parliament (in our view unjustly) approved in 2005 for terror
suspects who cannot be prosecuted. Instead they have been subjected first to imprisonment
without trial or charge, virtually indistinguishable from ATCSA internment but for the
excuse that it is pending deportation. Following that ordeal, some have been bailed under
conditions which amount to a control orders regime − partial house arrest. Yet they are all
either persons who in law cannot be deported because of the risk of torture,until and unless that risk is deemed to have been eliminated,and/or persons whose asylum claim process was
unfinished according to normal procedures.
The label pending deportation which has been used to justify their internment and then
house arrest thus appears to have no justification. It is in fact being used to create a parallel
or alternative route to punishment without trial, without even the safeguards which
Parliament laid down in the PTA 2005. Whilst we opposed that Act as unjust, our point here
is that the intentions of Parliament in 2005 are being flouted by this dangerous, illogical
parallel regime. Even the detention regime for other asylum see ers, which we also oppose, is much less harsh than the conditions to which these men have been subjected.
We would, moreover, question whether the bail conditions which have actually been
imposed in the case of Mr S (see Appendix A) are justified by the Immigration Act 1971. It
does permits the Secretary of State to impose conditions with regard to residence and
reporting to the police, and (as later amended)permits tagging of detainees. As far as we
know, however, this Act has not previously been interpreted to justify restrictions on visitors
or constant searches of the accommodation. As reported above, the searches experienced by
one host (Appendix A) extend to the whole premises, not just to checking the tagging
apparatus. Moreover his computer may be removed for up to 48 hours for inspection,
according to the conditions which have been set a gross imposition on an innocent
volunteer who has offered to help a person already judged innocent in a British court. Again,
from the example of this case, the arrangements for detention and bail under the 1971 Act
are being transformed into a control order regime.
*Notes for editors*
1.The testimony referred to here - whether quoted or not - was prepared for
Parliament's Joint Committee on Human Rights, and is the Committee's property. The
Committee allows people submitting material to publish and publicise their
submissions on condition that an indication that it was prepared for the Committee is
given. CAMPACC grants permission to re-publish, quote from, or otherwise make
use of material from the submission included in this press release only if the
requirement of the Committee is met.
__The following is a submission to the Joint Committee on Human Rights regarding their inquiry into control orders.__
We welcome your inquiry into powers to impose control orders.
By way of background to our submission, our campaign was set up in early 2001 to oppose
the Terrorism Act 2000. We are a non-party organisation supported by a number of lawyers,
advocates for refugee and migrant communities,and civil liberties campaigners. We opposed
the 2000 Act and subsequent anti-terrorism legislation of 2001 and 2005 on several grounds,
as argued in documents which can be seen on our web site, www.campacc.org.uk . Of
particular relevance to the current submission, we opposed internment powers under the
Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act, and later the power to impose control orders, as
well as the current proposal for extending the maximum detention period without charge.
Our campaign links human rights campaigners with people targeted by the anti-terror powers
and provides practical support for them, e.g. protest events, letters, bail surety and home
visits to persons under control orders. From that experience we have special expertise in the
human effects of anti-terror powers, as well as insights into how they are used.
By a coincidence of timing, your deadline comes a day after publication of Lord Carliles
report on control orders. His report warrants at least a brief comment,as a contrast to our
submission. Overall his report reinforces the emergency mentality by which the government
warns about further suicide bombings, labels individuals as terror suspects and so justifies
the use of control orders − with no need for evidence in court. He asks that police chiefs
should explain why there is not enough evidence for prosecutions rather than ask the
government to demonstrate why control orders are necessary to protect the public from
violence. Lord Carlile acknowledges concerns about potential psychological effects of
control orders, and about family and other arrangements for the suspects. He suggests the
restrictions have been extremely restrictive and close to what would need an opt-out from
European human rights laws. As we will argue, his euphemisms sanitise gross abuses of
human rights − indeed, punishment without trial − and downplays a great inconsistency with
the ECHR.
When the governments proposal for control orders was going through Parliament about a
year ago, CAMPACC denounced this new power to impose punishment on those not proven
guilty. As we further said:-
any criminal charge. They would not necessarily be told of the evidence against them. Like the
internment power which the Law Lords have rejected, such orders impose punishment without
conviction through a proper jury trial. This would violate a fundamental principle of justice; the
right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. Such powers would impose a criminal-type
sentence without trial, in the name of preventing hypothetical crimes (CAMPACC statement,7
February 2005).
Our ominous prediction has been more than vindicated in practice, for the following reasons:
children, from the wider society, even from friends or relatives. In some cases, detainees relatives have not been given permission to visit even several months after
applying. The punishment without trial extends to wives and children, and even to
those providing accommodation, since visitors to the whole household are restricted by
Home Office vetting arrangements. This is a form of collective punishment which
violates natural justice and international law.
accommodation can be searched by the police, or by a monitoring company checking
tagging apparatus, at any time. Distress to the entire family is apparent in the testimony
of Mahmoud Abu Rideh to journalists. For example, My kids worry that when they
get back from school I will be gone and they might not find me again. My wife cant
sleep. She is asking me not to go out again (Control order flaws exposed, The
Guardian, 24 March 2005). A month later he visited a police station, asking for a
return to prison custody rather than having an electronic tag re-fitted (Tagged terror
suspect sent back to jail, The Guardian, 29 April 2005; copies to be included with our
letter). Similar distress is documented in a statement from the bail-accommodation
provider for Mr S (Appendix A). Likewise the distress and social isolation of an entire
family as well as the person put under restrictions (Appendix B).
well as some persons detained and bailed under the 1971 Immigration Act − is
officially classified as a known associate of a terror suspect (Independent, 15
December 2005, pp.1-2, copy to be posted with our letter). As volunteers to visit and
support people who are victims of a law we oppose, we proudly defy that ridiculous
stigma. But many other people are intimidated, especially friends or relatives who do
not hold UK citizenship and so rightly feel more vulnerable to persecution. All this
illustrates the more general role of anti-terror laws in terrorising Muslim and migrant
communities.
Although your committees investigation presently concerns only control orders, the 1971
Immigration Act has been used for similar purposes. That is, certain Immigration Act
detainees have been bailed under conditions similar to control orders or even under greater
restrictions. As we detail below, in effect it has been used to create a parallel regime to that
of control orders. Under their bail conditions, for example, they must speak to no one who
has not been authorised by the Home Office. Some even undergo full house arrest, which
should require a `derogation from Article 5 of the ECHR unless it can be shown that
deportation will take place within a reasonable period. Bail has been granted precisely
because it seems doubtful that this is the case. Whatever changes may be made to the control
orders regime, those changes (hopefully, improvements) will not touch the parallel regime
under the 1971 Immigration Act, which remains.
Regardless of which law is used to impose special conditions, they may amount to virtual
house arrest. In this way the government in effect re-creates internment, pending a judicial
process which could last for many years.
Moreover, they create a domestic prison for anyone who acts as a host, e.g.the persons
family, friend or volunteer (e.g.supporters of our campaign). All such people are subject to
impromptu searches and removal of property including computers. The household is
prohibited from having visitors not approved by the Home Office. All this amounts to
punishment without trial for the host, as well as for the person directly under restrictions. Thus the government extends punishment to the detainees associates. In this way, the
system deters people from acting as host and so makes bail more difficult to obtain.
Those patterns illustrate how the government is using a variety of powers to circumvent
normal judicial procedures, even to circumvent the Law Lords ruling that internment
violated the ECHR. According to the governments own account of the Prevention of
Terrorism Act 2005, no derogation from the ECHR would be necessary unless control orders
impose house arrest. Yet in practice it has imposed virtual house arrest without the overt
shame or burden of such derogation (see Appendix C).
*Impracticability of control order regimes for single men using rented accommodation*
Lastly, the viability of control orders as an alternative to the (completely unacceptable)
practice of internment depends on it being practical for persons subject to these orders to live
in the community outside of prison. This is not the case for control orders, nor for the
parallel regime under the Immigration Act 1971 (see Appendix C). These regimes have been
operated in such a way as to make it impractical to expect detainees without families and
family homes to be released from prison or detention centres to live under control orders,
even where their house arrest is only partial. If detainees friends, supporters and lawyers try
to rent them a self-contained flat which can be proposed as bail accommodation, the need for
access and equipment installations by the tagging company makes landlords unwilling to let,
especially if informed by the police of the nature of their proposed tenant. If accommodation
with a resident landlord is proposed, then the conditions of life for the host are made
impossible. The host may not receive his or her friends as visitors, since they are not vetted
to visit the detainee, and must accept searches and inspections by the tagging company and
police at any time. These issues mean that finding accommodation where the conditions of a
control order can be met is extraordinarily difficult for single detainees, so that there is
nowhere they can stay outside of a prison. For this reason alone, the regime of both control
orders and the parallel regime of bail under the 1971 Act needs to be made less strict, even
if it were not for the overwhelming concerns about the injustice and inhumanity of any
system of punishment without trial.
*Conclusion*
Drawing on our direct experience, this letter has outlined gross abuses of human rights under
both the PTA 2005 and the Immigration Act 1971. Do these practices conform to the
intention of Parliament when enacting those laws? Do these practices comply with human
rights law, especially the ECHR? We urge your committee to investigate those abuses.
Our supporters would be pleased to send further information or to present oral evidence at
any hearings.
Estella Schmid
On behalf of
Campaign Against Criminalising Communities (CAMPACC)
*Appendix A: Mr Qavi s personal account as a bail-accommodation provider*
I came in contact with Mr S for the first time, on 19th April, 2005, when, before Asylum and
Immigration Tribunal, I undertook to provide a bail address for him. He stayed with me in
my flat for about 4 weeks, after which he moved to a NASS-provided accommodation
elsewhere.
On the morning of 15th September 2005 he was, in a highly publicised raid, arrested and
taken to Long Lartin. He was ordered released by SIAC [Special Immigration Appeals
Commission ] on 17th January, 2006 on bail conditions which are more restrictive than the
control orders system. The bail conditions of his release oblige Mr S to wear a tag at
all times, to report to the police station every day between 12 noon to 2 pm, not to leave the
bail address at all times save for the period from 10.00 am to 4.00 pm etc. His movements
are restricted to a marked area which he is required not to leave. He is forbidden to receive
any visitor other than his solicitor while staying at my place. The police and Immigration
personnel and others working on behalf of Home Secretary can call at any time and without
prior notice to enter the bail residence to check on him.
I offered to stand surety and provide him a bail address early in December 2005. On this
occasion, the Home Office chose to impose "surety conditions" in drips, seemingly designed
to prolong the process and to dissuade me from providing a bail address by sheer
unreasonableness of the conditions they initially sought to impose. The result being that Mr
S's release on bail was delayed for weeks.
The "surety conditions" require me not to permit my friends, neighbours and acquaintances
to enter my residence unless I provide the visitor's name, address, date of birth and a
photograph at least 3 days beforehand to the Home Office and seek its approval as to the
time and date and the expected duration of the visit. My lap top can be inspected and taken
away for up to 48 hours. My residence can be entered by police and immigration officials at
any time without prior notice,etc.
The "surety conditions"are grossly restrictive and infringe
on my civil liberties as a British citizen. I have been obliged to place myself and my
residence under quarantine in order to seek the release of a friendless, young asylum seeker
from unjust and unlawful imprisonment.
Since 17th January 2006 my home has been visited by various police and immigration people
on three difference occasions - all without notice and at abrupt hours of their choosing. The
last visit took place on Saturday 28th January 2006 when 3 officials called at 6.30 pm, just as
I had sat down with my newspaper. They wanted to check the tagging equipment. For the
next 50 minutes they wandered around all over my place in their unclean shoes, checking
each and every corner over and over again. They tacked a lead of wire to one of the door
frames and fixed a portable antenna for their equipment to the top of the door. A hideous
sight which none of the "surety conditions" say they are allowed to do.
At odd hours and for no discernable reason, the tagging company telephones to enquire of
Mr S where he was 3 minutes or 7 minutes ago. At other times, the tagging company rings
and when Mr S picks up the telephone, there is no one on the line. When he calls back to ask
why the telephone rang, he is told we did not call you. All this is happening in my presence
and within my hearing.
During 4 months of incarceration, Mr S has lost some 20 kg in weight and looks a shadow of
himself. He is psychologically traumatised by the circumstances of his arrest on 15th September, 2005 when his front door was smashed and he was severely beaten up by
immigration and police personnel. He carries injuries to his knee and leg which require
medical attention.
*Appendix B: Les Levidow s account as a visitor*
When the solicitors Birnberg Peirce requested volunteers to visit individuals put under
control orders in spring 2005, I responded as a supporter of CAMPACC. Previously I had no
personal contact with such individuals, though I had actively campaigned for their release
from unjust detention. On my behalf, Birnberg Peirce applied to the Home Office for
permission for me to visit such individuals. By the time I was assigned to one, Mr G, he had
been re-arrested for deportation to Algeria and then placed under house arrest under the
Immigration Act 1971.
Mr G was released from prison on the basis that he had a family here who could host him.
His house has been effectively turned into a domestic prison, in many ways. Guests are
prohibited unless approved by the Home Office. It still had not given approval to some
friends and relatives, many months after they submitted a request. Great distress results from
the family s isolation, as well as from the constant apprehension about police raids, about
security companies checking the electronic tag, etc. The latter seems all the more absurd,
given that Mr G remains bound to a wheelchair, physically unable to move around without it.
When I have visited Mr G,he and his family were very appreciative because human rights
campaigners have become an important contact with the outside world. He explained to me
the difficulty of his bail conditions, which prohibit any conversation with anyone not
approved by the Home Office. Eventually the judge allowed him to go out to his back
garden for a couple of hours per day, but Mr G decided not to take up this opportunity.
Why? Probably neighbours in his housing co-operative would say hello. As a human being,
Mr G would find it unbearable to ignore them. If he simply says hello, then he could be
returned to prison for breaking his bail conditions. The dilemma well illustrates how these
conditions abuse human rights, as well as serving a political agenda of social isolation.
As I eventually learned from a newspaper article, when someone applies to the Home Office
for permission to visit such a person, s/he classified as a known associate of a terror suspect
(Independent ,15 December 2005,pp.1-2). Such a stigma is a primary political purpose of
the anti-terror laws. It effectively deters many people from such association.
*Appendix C: The parallel regime of control-order style bail conditions under the
Immigration Act 1971*
This issue has emerged in relation to some immigration detainees whom the government
wants to deport to Algeria, Libya and Jordan. These are countries notorious for torture, with
which the government has been seeking `no-torture agreements for some time. Some
individuals released from ACTSA internment to a control orders regime under the PTA 2005
were re-detained in prison under the Immigration Act 1971 in August 2005, apparently
because it was thought that such agreements would soon be concluded and the government
then intended to deport them. Other individuals who had been accused, but not convicted of
terrorism, in the well-known ricin trial and released as innocent men in spring 2005 were
also re-detained in August-September under the Immigration Act 1971.
When it became apparent that deportation would not be imminent because the agreements
with other governments had not yet been concluded, bail was granted to a few such people.
This immigration bail has been under conditions even stricter than those previously used or
envisaged under control orders. Four such cases were featured in an excellent article in The
Independent (15 December,pages 1-2). In one of these cases, which may not be the only
one, the detainee is not permitted to leave his accommodation at all, yet no derogation from
Article 5 of the ECHR has been sought from Parliament as laid down as necessary for those
control orders under the PTA 2005 which constitute full house arrest. Our supporters have
direct experience of hosting or visiting some of these individuals (see Appendix B).
When responding to the Law Lords ruling on internment under the ATCSA 2001,
Parliament sought an alternative which did not breach the ECHR. The spirit of their
judgement, which should surely be reflected in all subsequent treatment of terror suspects,
was that imprisonment without trial or charge is simply unacceptable. However, the scope of
their judgement related to people with a right to reside in the UK or those who could not be
deported due to a risk that they would be tortured if returned to their country of origin. Since
the summer of 2005, we have seen the emergence of a parallel regime of internment under
the Immigration Act 1971, using the excuse that those affected are being detained pending
deportation. At least one person (Detainee G) who was first interned under ATCSA 2001,
then released under a control order, then re-arrested and detained in prison under the
Immigration Act 1971, has now been bailed under complete house arrest under that Act.
Full house arrest under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 requires a decision to derogate
from the ECHR, justified by a `national emergency, yet this parallel regime somehow
escapes that requirement; no such derogation has been made or sought. The justification for
house arrest or detention without trial or charge under the Immigration Act 1971 is
apparently that deportation is imminent. Yet when G was placed under a control order, it was
precisely because he could __not__ be deported due to the risk of torture. Nothing had changed
with regard to that question by the time he was re-arrested in August 2005 (with others in
somewhat similar circumstances,of whom more shortly). The UK government had merely
decided to negotiate with the Algerian government with a view to obtaining assurances that
returned persons would not be tortured. Here lies an important legal issue: whether someone
can be regarded as detained pending deportation when the agreement that is supposed to
make that deportation acceptable under Article 3 of the ECHR as a procedure for a whole
category of persons has not yet been tried and tested in the UK courts. It is illogical to
maintain that G s situation changed because a no torture agreement was __under negotiation__.
This argument is quite separate from our considerable scepticism that the Algerian
governments undertakings can be trusted.
A similar but slightly different argument can be applied to those who were re-arrested in
August under the Immigration Act 1971 having been acquitted (or had charges against them
dropped)in the so-called ricin trial. These men are still in Immigration Act detention or
have been bailed under partial house arrest. These are innocent men; to deny this would be to
reject the outcome of the normal and proper judicial procedure which they went through. Nor
was any new evidence put forward against them, nor were they subjected to control orders
under the procedure that Parliament (in our view unjustly) approved in 2005 for terror
suspects who cannot be prosecuted. Instead they have been subjected first to imprisonment
without trial or charge, virtually indistinguishable from ATCSA internment but for the
excuse that it is pending deportation. Following that ordeal, some have been bailed under
conditions which amount to a control orders regime − partial house arrest. Yet they are all
either persons who in law cannot be deported because of the risk of torture,until and unless that risk is deemed to have been eliminated,and/or persons whose asylum claim process was
unfinished according to normal procedures.
The label pending deportation which has been used to justify their internment and then
house arrest thus appears to have no justification. It is in fact being used to create a parallel
or alternative route to punishment without trial, without even the safeguards which
Parliament laid down in the PTA 2005. Whilst we opposed that Act as unjust, our point here
is that the intentions of Parliament in 2005 are being flouted by this dangerous, illogical
parallel regime. Even the detention regime for other asylum see ers, which we also oppose, is much less harsh than the conditions to which these men have been subjected.
We would, moreover, question whether the bail conditions which have actually been
imposed in the case of Mr S (see Appendix A) are justified by the Immigration Act 1971. It
does permits the Secretary of State to impose conditions with regard to residence and
reporting to the police, and (as later amended)permits tagging of detainees. As far as we
know, however, this Act has not previously been interpreted to justify restrictions on visitors
or constant searches of the accommodation. As reported above, the searches experienced by
one host (Appendix A) extend to the whole premises, not just to checking the tagging
apparatus. Moreover his computer may be removed for up to 48 hours for inspection,
according to the conditions which have been set a gross imposition on an innocent
volunteer who has offered to help a person already judged innocent in a British court. Again,
from the example of this case, the arrangements for detention and bail under the 1971 Act
are being transformed into a control order regime.
*Notes for editors*
1.The testimony referred to here - whether quoted or not - was prepared for
Parliament's Joint Committee on Human Rights, and is the Committee's property. The
Committee allows people submitting material to publish and publicise their
submissions on condition that an indication that it was prepared for the Committee is
given. CAMPACC grants permission to re-publish, quote from, or otherwise make
use of material from the submission included in this press release only if the
requirement of the Committee is met.