"It is a disgrace that young children from perhaps the age of five to 14 are held in a prison environment" Bishop John Mone.

    Catholic bishops in Scotland have began a national campaign to free children from detention. They have condemned the holding of children in Dungavel Removal/detention centre.

    President of the Catholic Church's 'Justice and Peace Commission', recently visited Dungavel and was quoted by BBC News Online as saying, "I feel it is a disgrace that young children from perhaps the age of five to 14 are held in a prison environment and are deprived of many of the rights that are enshrined in the Declaration of Human Rights"

  "Regardless of the differing opinions in the current debate about how asylum seekers are to be dealt with it is abhorrent that children are being kept in a prison environment behind security fences and barbed wire with their freedom of movement severely curtailed."

  The Bishops call upon the Home Secretary to immediately close the Family Unit at Dungavel and to employ an alternative and more humane method in dealing with the applications these families have made for asylum.

    Bishop Patrick O'Donoghue: Given that immigration and asylum are national issues, Bishop Patrick O'Donoghue (Chairman, Office for Refugee Policy, Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales ) has agreed to (actively) endorse the statement of the Scottish Bishops regarding the treatment of asylum children.

     Churches‚ Commission for Racial Justice endorses the Scottish Catholic Bishop's view that it is completely unacceptable to detain children in the removal centre at Dungavel. Indeed, in a country historically known for its jealous protection of children, particularly in the light of the recent spate of physical abuse and brutal murders of children, we are deeply dismayed that the immigration service are incarcerating children in the penal regimes.

 Michael Connarty Scottish Labour MP, on the detention of children "It is wrong, it is immoral"   

    "We can see no justification for the detention of children. The risk of absconding does not outweigh the damage done to children being denied their freedom."

          Scottish Parliament's Cross Party Group on Refugees and Asylum seekers , April 2002

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Churches Commission For Racial Justice (CCRJ)

Children in Dungavel Immigration Removal Centre

Have the children been found guilty because they seek asylum?

     Churches‚ Commission for Racial Justice (CCRJ) has consistently opposed the detention of people seeking asylum in these islands; but we particularly deplore the practice of detaining them in UK penal institutions. Children are the gift of God to humanity, and this is recognized by their protection under international and UK legislation. They are defenceless, vulnerable and susceptible to psychological, physical and emotional trauma such confined incarceration can cause.

     The education of children who are refugees within asylum camps was an extremely retrograde move; but their detention callously excludes them from the benefits of normal growth in society, and contradicts Government's policy on community cohesion. Government should not exclude the children of people seeking asylum from its target to eradicate child poverty.

      As Christians for whom justice and dignity are absolutely essential for a meaningful, secure and healthy life, we urge the Home Office to release immediately all children detained in Dungavel, and find appropriate accommodation for them and their parents.

Arllington Trotman, for CCRJ

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Enquiries/further information:

Scottish Catholic Church's 'Justice and Peace Commission'
Justice and Peace 0141 333 0238

Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales
John Joseet 020 7901 4862

Churches Commission For Racial Justice (CCRJ)
Arlington Trotman 020-7523-2128