The court of appeal has granted an 11th hour reprieve to detainees scheduled to be flown to Jamaica tomorrow
Approximately 50 people were due to be deported to Jamaica but several have won a last-minute reprieve following an emergency ruling by the court of appeal based on the fact that some detainees may not have had adequate access to their legal representatives as they are entitled to by law due to a failure of the telephone network at the detention centres at which they were housed.
The Home Office in the UK has been ordered not to remove anyone scheduled to be deported from two detention centres unless the department is satisfied the detainee had access to a functioning telephone on or before February 3.
The case was brought for Detention Action which called on the Home Office take basic, humane and fair steps to allow the detainees to exercise their constitutional right to access justice and forms part of a number of emergency legal actions brought in recent days in an attempt to prevent the resumption of deportations. An earlier case brought on behalf of 13 Jamaican-born men on the grounds that the home secretary, Priti Patel, had acted unlawfully, breached human rights legislation and denied the claimants adequate access to legal advice by forcing them on to the plane, failed in the lower court but was expected to be reheard on appeal.
Issues regarding the men’s the right to family life and the integrity of the family unit have also been raised as some deportees will be forced to leave partners and children in the UK. Some deportees are also concerned that the high profile the issue of deportations is being given coupled with the Home Office’s announcements in the media and in parliament about the charter flight mean the safety of men being deported will be at risk on their arrival in Jamaica.
There are calls for all deportations to be halted until the report announcing the results of the investigation into Windrush scandal is published. It is argued that individuals who have lived most of their lives in the UK should be given special consideration by the Home Office and should not face automatic deportation.
