19 youngsters admitted to detention centre this year
By Catie Guitart

LAST Tuesday, Sulaiti Wahuyo and her two-year-old son Gabriel were fingerprinted, photographed, issued with a number and an identification card, which must be carried at all times - and then imprisoned.

While not convicted of any crime, as failed asylum-seekers, she and her child were incarcerated in Scotland's notorious Dungavel Immigration Removal Centre. Their plight is an indictment of the UK government which promised the people of Scotland last year that no more children and their families would be held like prisoners behind barbed wire.

Wahuyo and her son are just one of many mothers and children to be held in Dungavel so far this year, the Sunday Herald has learned.

Wahuyo is no stranger to detention. Suspected of supporting a rebel group in her native Uganda, she was arrested by soldiers, and held incommunicado for two years from October 2006 without trial. She eventually escaped to the UK with her infant son.

During her incarceration Wahuyo was repeatedly raped and tortured. She did not see her son Gabriel until her escape in October 2008.

On Thursday, Wahuyo and her child were taken from Dungavel to Yarl's Wood, in Bedfordshire, another holding centre, where she awaits her forcible removal to Uganda this Wednesday.

The Unity Centre in Glasgow, which supports refugee families, said: "Sulaiti is a law-abiding woman who is absolutely terrified of being sent back to Uganda. As a victim of torture and detention, it is unjust of the UK Border Agency to return Sulaiti."

The Unity campaigners say this mother and child's incarceration flies in the face of the UK government's pledge to provide an alternative to the detention of families.

On October 23, 2008, Secretary of State for Scotland Jim Murphy announced the introduction of a pilot scheme which would see up to four families at a time housed in former council flats in Glasgow, allowing them access to basic facilities for two weeks before being repatriated.

Murphy, a father of two, said: "One of the first things I did was to see whether we could bring this process forward. I would hope for it to be launched at the start of the new year."

Six months on, nothing has changed. The Unity Centre has recorded at least 19 children being detained with their families in Dungavel since the beginning of 2009.

According to the Centre, since January 1 at least two single parent families with four children have been detained.

Alice Lithgow, a volunteer at the Unity Centre, said: "Detention is supposed to be the last resort for children and only used for families considered to be a high risk of absconding. Of all groups of detainees, single mums with young children are the group least likely to abscond."

The Children's Commissioner for Scotland has threatened to report the UK and the Scottish government to the UN, as the continued confinement of asylum-seeking children under the age of 16 contravenes the Convention of the Rights of the Child.

While the Scottish government has no authority to intervene in Dungavel, as asylum matters are reserved to Westminster, the Scottish Government and local councils are responsible for ensuring child welfare.

A spokesperson for the UK Border Agency could not confirm any time frame for implementing the new policy, stating that details were yet to finalised.

A spokesperson for Glasgow City Council echoed that uncertainty: "It is hoped the project will become operational in the near future."

Concerns have been raised about the negative impact of imprisonment on children.

Following a surprise inspection at Dungavel in 2008, Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers said: "The plight of detained children remains of great concern. An immigration removal centre can never be a suitable place for children.

Any period of detention can be detrimental to children and their families."