A deportation flight to Jamaica left the UK with seven people on board after dozens of others were granted a last-minute legal reprieve, it has been estimated.
The charter flight, which was initially due to carry 112 people, is understood to have taken off in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Campaigners had been trying to halt the flight amid concerns over the legality of the government’s attempt to remove Jamaica nationals from the country, following claims that the majority of people came to the UK at a very young age and some may have a right to British citizenship.
Karen Doyle, lead campaigner of Movement for Justice, told The Independent: “We know the lives behind the ‘red meat’ headlines. The disabled wife of 21 years now without her husband and carer; the mum with a newborn and five-year-old crying in the early hours about losing her partner, her family; the children who have to find out they may never see their father in person again.
“In two cases for a single offence, people who’ve been out of prison for five, six years with zero reoffending.
“These flights are brutal and inhumane. Mass deportation charter flights are a cynical racist ploy by a failing government. Red meat and racism over human rights and compassion.”
Most of the Jamaican people who were facing deportation live with a disability or health problem, according to analysis shared with The Independent.
A number of the legal challenges are thought to include claims of modern slavery, which have more than doubled between 2017 and last year to 12,727 cases. Others are appealing on the basis of asylum, further representations and judicial reviews, it is understood.
Home Office minister Tom Pursglove lashed out at Labour for “imploring us to halt the removal of dangerous foreign criminals from our streets” – and claimed opposition MPs were “standing on the side of criminals, including paedophiles, murderers and rapists” while speaking in parliament on Wednesday.
Labour’s shadow Home Office minister Stephen Kinnock criticised Mr Pursglove’s “petulant rant” and government “incompetence” in deporting foreign criminals.“
The Home Office must deport dangerous foreign criminals who have no right to be in our country and who should be returned to the country of their citizenship,” Mr Kinnock said – adding “but the Home Office also has a responsibility to get its deportation decisions right”.
“As the government has itself admitted, during the Windrush scandal, the Home Office made grave errors in both detention and deport decisions,” the Labour politician said.
“The Home Office is currently failing on all counts, we on these benches are committed to the principles of an immigration system which is firm, far and well managed.”
A recent Public Accounts committee (PAC) report revealed that the Home Office has had to release six in every ten migrant detainees who they wanted to deport – and the department couldn’t explain why this was happening. Earlier and better quality legal advice would make decision making more robust, the committee suggested.
Moreover, a Windrush Lessons Learned report identified that the Home Office was afflicted by low-quality decision making and an “irrational approach to individuals”.
Last year, government adviser and lawyer Martin Forde QC said deportation flights were “seriously undermining” the Home Office’s work on the Windrush Compensation Scheme because victims of the scandal “don’t trust” the department.
About 30 people who were detained at Colnbrook Immigration Removal Centre, and not due to fly to Jamaica, blocked the exercise yard on Tuesday evening to try to prevent immigration officers from removing three men due to be deported, The Independent has heard.
However, the demonstration was dispersed and the men were taken to Stansted airport to board the flight.
Among those who were removed from the deportation list is James Matthews, a former banker who was unlawfully detained and threatened with forced removal while awaiting the outcome of an application for leave to remain in the UK, according to his lawyers. The 33-year-old is suing the Home Office for this alleged breach of his rights, The Independent revealed on Friday.
“Everyone should be entitled to the freedom and right to live their lives and be happy,” Mr Matthews told The Independent from his cell at Harmondsworth last Friday.
“However, that doesn’t appear to be the case here. If I had done something wrong then this would have been my mistake but I did everything by the book. I’m not a criminal – so why am I being treated like one?”
The last four flights of this type to Jamaica have taken just 17, 13, seven and four passengers.
The government has previously insisted that deportation flights were designed to remove “dangerous foreign criminals” from the UK, however Mr Matthews – a previous candidate for Jamaica’s Constabulary Force – does not meet these criteria and is a law-abiding citizen.
