There are three officers coming to take one of the women in the yard. They want to take her to the airport. The women are surrounding her so they can’t move her. They still want to take her but there are loads of us surrounding her. One of the officers is intimidating us and calling for more back up.
Yarls Wood
I served a sentence in prison.
I served a sentence in prison. While I was in prison social services gets involved with my children. And my husband went to prison as well. The family court ruled that when I’m released I should resume the care of my children. But immigration brought me to Yarl’s Wood instead. My deportation is not immanent because I have a judicial review that will take 8 months. I would be on licence anyway so my detention is not really necessary. I don’t see why they don’t release us while we are waiting for our case. I’m here 3 months already. It’s like I’m serving another sentence. And my children are serving another sentence with me because my detention really affects them. They say every child matters and all that and they are not living up to it. They say in the policy that its all about the child’s interest but it doesn’t matter when it comes down to my detention. I don’t know what’s happening I’m just frustrated. I met someone who’s been here for 18 months and it’s really unnecessary. It’s a problem. I’ve done the time, I’ve paid my debts to society and now it’s time to be with my family. It’s like a punishment all over again. My children suffer because of my permanent detention. Everyone should have a chance to move on.
We are tired of this place.
We are tired of this place. Most the people here, they took us when we were reporting during our applications. And then before they reply they detain us when we report. The Home Office haven’t replied to me and then they just detain us. The way they treat us here is not alright and the food is not good at all. I was due for an operation when they detained me. I told them and called Medical Justice also. But the detention centre don’t care. We want people in detention centres to be free. They want us to work here for one pound an hour. Is it that fair?
They are still holding on very strongly. We have almost fifty.
They are still holding on very strongly. We have almost fifty. We are singing and chanting and dancing. We are keeping ourselves warm because it is a bit cold. And the media at the same time. We are planning to be here until 9pm. We don’t eat. We don’t do anything. We don’t want their food. We don’t want their activities. We just want our freedom.
Mostly there are people who shouldn’t be here. They are here unlawfully. Some are pregnant and have long term health conditions. We don’t understand why they detain us. Don’t we have rights? Are we not women? Some of us have been here for a number of years. Does this not count for anything?
I’ve been detained for 19 months. My son is going to school this morning.
I’ve been detained for 19 months. My son is going to school this morning. There are mothers detained. Why can’t they let us go. We are looking after ourselves. This place is inhumane. We have no voice. No one care about us. We want to be free. We want everyone to be free. We see the refugees coming in. What about about us as well. We’ve been here for so long. We need to be free. Let us go to look after our children and cook our own food. WE’ve got people who do serious self harm, those with depression. There are sick people and there is no proper health care system to care for them. They give paracetamol to everyone. The food is bad. There are elderly ladies here. It’s like back in the day slavery. Something has to happen. We haven’t got a voice in here. The officers intimidate us.
We are having peaceful protest.
We are having peaceful protest. We are saying we want freedom and we want detention to be shut down. The main agenda is freedom. WE don’t want to be detained for no good reason. We are victims of torture, we are victims of rape and some have mental health problems. They are still being locked up. The law says you can’t do this but most of these women here have these experiences. WE want people to hear our voice. We want to be treated like any other human being. WE are not crimanls. We have been looking for safety in the United Kingdom. But we experience this torture.
MPs will be discussing this in Parliament this week. And we want them to vote to shut them down. We want all the MPs to say no people can be locked up. We haven’t done anything. We are calling on people voting on the 10th of September to vote for detention to come to an end. It is unfair for people to locked up for no good reason. Why should this continue? If they believe in human rights, we want them to vote for detention to come to an end.
We want to be free. We want detention to end.
We want to be free. We want detention to end. We want this torture of women and pregnant women to end. We have been locked up for a long time. We have been in detention as a scape goat. We need this to end. We want our freedom. Release us! I want to go home!
I’ve been in UK 17 years…. I’ve been here for 12 years. we belong here.
“We want freedom…All we are saying…..We want Freedom…”
We are in the yard, We are protesting.
We are in the yard, We are protesting. We’ve been here for over an hour since 9 oclock. There are thirty of us. We are asking for our freedom. We chanting for our freedom. We are shouting. We are singing ‘Freedom, Freedom, Freedom, We want our own Freedom’.
I was there on Saturday.
I was there on Saturday. The ladies were really psyched about the demonstration outside. I was one of the people getting people together. I have been outside with Movement for justice when I was out.
It gives people so much hope. The more people that shows up at the demonstration, the more hope that is given to people in here. The more ladies were gathering inside, the more officers were hanging around. This was quite intimidating for the ladies. The ladies would come out from the rooms where they could see the protesters. The officers were saying we should get down from the tables and stop shouting. They were saying they would be put in trouble.
They had set up bingo for the time of the protest and the door is locked the whole time for bingo. So you can’t go outside and see the protest. A few people went. Some people think that the Serco people are going to help them get released. They get scared.
There is one woman, she doesn’t take nonsense from the officers. She will talk back to them. They are always searching her, they don’t give her a break. If they see you hanging around her then the officers say why are you hanging around her? It will go on your file. They don’t like seeing us with her. These things scared people.
From my side on Dove I could say around 50 ladies saw the protest and around 30 were participating with them shouting. But there were also people from the other units who saw it.
The protest was a sort of empowerment. Some people didn’t know about protests but when they saw it they were moved. They kept saying that this is good, this is good. It gives me courage to go on and maybe one day one time they will be closed down.
This is my second time in Yarl’s Wood. When you get to detention centre the first time I hated the fact I was locked up. I was there for 7 months. That time messed me up so much, even when I was outside. The second time is worse. It was harder than before because I was released for three months and now I’m back. It makes me feel that I didn’t do much. For the first 1 and half month of being released, I was still trapped. I didn’t go out, I only went out for appointments. I used to feel that they were watching me like the cameras and the officers. It was weird. I wasn’t able to do anything for my case and I feel like I wasted that time because these things time. People don’t deserve to be in here.
There are different women in here, with different cases and different issues and they’re all put in the same place. And people harm themselves. And even those who don’t think of that, they see it and get scared. It doesn’t make sense. It is a weird place to be in.
The protest was amazing
The protesting was amazing! I enjoyed every single moment. That was the time to let that anger out and put forward the craving for freedom. Yarls Wood is such a confinement and a depressing place that detainees were hoping that protesters would break the gate so we could escape. Some had their bags ready just in case. I am sure what we did will not be a waste. Thanks to everyone for such a great day.
detained voices 