London: New data obtained through freedom of information laws shows that £2.3m was spent on forcibly removing 225 people to European countries in July, August and September this year – double the amount spent on deportation flights in the previous quarter, when 285 people were removed. On average, the cost of removing each deportee – many of whom were asylum seekers – was just over £10,100, compared with £3,900 in the second quarter of the year. As a comparison, a commercial flight ticket from the UK to Australia costs just over £900. Some of the charter flights that have left the UK since July 2020 took off with a fraction of the plane’s capacity onboard, with flights to Finland and Sweden carrying six and five people respectively, and one to France carrying a single deportee. It comes amid concerns that the Home Office is “rushing” through deportations of asylum seekers under Dublin III – a regulation that allows the UK to send refugees back to EU countries they have passed through – which will cease to exist when the Brexit transition period ends on 31 December.
A report by the Prison Inspectorate published earlier this month found that late cancellations of removal directions were “not unusual”, with numerous deportees having been taken off charter flights hours before they were due to take off in recent months. In one case cited in the report, a charter flight to France in October that was due to take 30 deportees – most or all of whom were asylum seekers – ended up deporting just one person, with nine people taken off on the same day as the flight. Charlie Taylor, HM chief inspector of prisons, said: “Such cancellations were commonplace and suggest that detainees’ vulnerabilities, which often lead to cancellations, are not identified early enough.”
Read more: May Bulman, Independent, https://is.gd/4jlHJm
