MERCY Baguma. Adnan Walid Elbi. Henok Zaid Gebrsslasie. You may have read these names in tragic headlines over the last two years, as all three were asylum seekers who died in Home Office housing.
But despite the sporadic media attention, the UK Government has ignored calls from campaigners and opposition politicians to publish the number of people who die in accommodation it has provided.
In the absence of the “robust system … which takes account of every loss of life in the asylum system” which Scottish Refugee Council chief executive Sabir Zazai has called for, a new project is aiming to plug the gap.
The newly launched Asylum Seeker Memorial Project has set out to catalogue “as much information as possible” about the people who have died while in Home Office accommodation since 2016.
As it stands, there are 140 people on that list, and the vast majority of them died in the last two years.
Four people died in Home Office housing in 2019, which rose to 38 in 2020, 48 in 2021, and 27 from January to August of this year, the project’s data shows.
Amid the pressure of the Covid pandemic, 2020 saw the Tory government turn more and more to using hotels or former army barracks to house asylum seekers.
In 2021, then home secretary Priti Patel (below) faced calls to resign after a court ruled that accommodating asylum seekers in Napier Barracks – where a Covid outbreak infected around 200 people – had been unlawful.
Still more people have died in immigration detention, for which the Home Office does publish statistics. Earlier in November an unnamed man died, possibly from diphtheria, while at a UK Government centre in Manston, Kent.
The Asylum Seeker Memorial Project’s website explains: “The deaths of unaccompanied child asylum seekers don’t appear in the data … nor do the deaths of those with refugee status staying in Home Office hotels under schemes such as the Afghan Relocation and Assistance Policy.
“Deaths of asylum seekers detained at immigration removal centres or short-term holding facilities, such as Manston, are not recorded in this data.”
The Asylum Seeker Memorial Project🕯️ Here we tell the stories of people who died in asylum seeker housing in the UK since 2016. The Gov does not publish data on deaths in its accommodation. We set out to gather it. ⚠️:distressing details ➡️https://t.co/jMWoiX5KGl pic.twitter.com/HnbvHrzYCP
— Liberty Investigates (@LInvestigates) November 27, 2022
The project, which is run by journalists from Liberty Investigates, further notes that it is “hard to attribute causes to the apparent high rates of death, but reports of poor conditions in hotels and other accommodation as well as difficulties accessing medical and other support may contribute”.
Eleanor Rose, Liberty Investigates’ investigations editor, said: “We all have the right to be treated with dignity, respect and compassion, no matter who we are.
“Those fleeing persecution or conflict in their homelands are often left struggling in poor accommodation, far from the people who care about them. Their deaths often go unannounced or forgotten.
“We hope this memorial – pieced together by our tenacious investigative journalists – goes some way to telling the stories of those the Home Secretary may otherwise forget. By giving a name to the victims, we want to remind the Government of the families out there who deserve answers.”
SNP MP Anne McLaughlin, her party's immigrations spokesperson at Westminster, told The National that she welcomed the "important project".
McLaughlin said: "I am, not for the first time, in awe of the work of Liberty Investigates – and also delighted to see that the Scottish Refugee Council collaborated with them.
"This memorial tells us that everyone's life matters. Reading through [the project's findings] is heartbreaking but that shouldn't stop us, and I would encourage everyone to take a few minutes out of their day to read about who these people were."
Last week, Home Secretary Suella Braverman admitted the UK Government has failed to control the UK’s borders – and blamed migrants crossing the Channel for overcrowding at the Manston processing centre.
At its peak earlier in November, 4000 people were being held there – more than double its 1600 capacity – a move which has seen the Home Office threatened with five legal actions over the site.
Braverman (above) also struggled to explain the legal routes which asylum seekers fleeing war and persecution could use to come to the UK.
A Home Office spokesperson said that unexpected or suspicious deaths in its asylum seeker accommodation are investigated in the same way as for the public.
They went on: “The welfare of asylum seekers is, and always will be, of the utmost importance to us. It is misleading to suggest that any death that occurs while someone is in the asylum system is a direct consequence of that system.
“We work closely with the NHS, local authorities, non-governmental organisations, and contractors to ensure that asylum seekers can access the healthcare and support they need.”
