Child Abuse?

Given the government's continued claim that children in detention in the UK are treated with care and respect despite all evidence to the contrary, the fact that a nine-year-old boy was kept locked up in a UK Borders Agency van with a number of strange people in uniforms outside the hospital that his mother had been taken to after she collapsed during an immigration raid.

According to David Wood, head of 'criminality' and detention for the UK Border Agency, the boy spent less than three hours in an unlocked people carrier with a female immigration officer. "Our immigration officers, who are specially trained to deal with families with children, considered this would be a less stressful environment for the child. He was relaxed and comfortable throughout, and provided with food and drink." He also added that the child was attended to by a qualified nurse after vomiting blood and later seen by a doctor.

But according to his family, he in fact repeatedly asked to see his mother and was terrified during the incarceration. His and his family were then taken to Yarl's Wood detention centre, told they would be deported the following day only to be released nearly 4 weeks later after their lawyers forced a review of their case.