 for Sussex says asylum seekers to be housed at Crowborough Army Camp should be made to wear electronic tags.){kind=link}
The police and crime commissioner (PCC) for Sussex says asylum seekers to be housed at Crowborough Army Training Camp should be made to wear electronic tags.
Katy Bourne said the tags would give asylum seekers “greater freedom” to travel further from the holding centre, help them get temporary jobs – and also help police identify them.
The Home Office delayed plans to temporarily house 540 asylum seekers at the army training camp until the new year. But as cadets have been moved off the site and preparation of the buildings has continued, it looks certain that the Govt will be pressing ahead with the plans.
Ms Bourne said: “With thousands of people awaiting asylum processing, the potential for them to become involved in crime – as a perpetrator or victim – is inevitable, meaning police will be looking for people with very little official ID or existing digital footprint in the UK.”
She added Sussex Police had launched an electronic tagging pilot for persistent shoplifters and the results were “promising”. “The police monitoring the tags can tell exactly where the offenders are and, so far, the shoplifters are changing their behaviours,” the PCC added.
Ms Bourne said if people refused to wear a tag “it would be an indication that they are intending to abscond or are involved in unlawful activity. I have a New Year’s resolution for the Home Secretary – why not be bold and pilot tagging of the men due to arrive soon at Crowborough? You might end up being thanked by taxpayers, the police and the migrants themselves.”
But the Home Office said the Immigration Act 2016 required electronic monitoring to be applied to people facing deportation – not those still being assessed for asylum – and without that circumstance it would breach human rights or be impractical.
A spokesperson added that electronic monitoring could also be used for non-foreign national offenders, where it was justified.
“This government will close every asylum hotel, and we are working to move asylum seekers into more suitable accommodation such as military bases, to ease pressure on communities across the country,” the Home Office said.
The government added that all asylum claimants were subject to mandatory security checks to confirm their identity and to link it to their biometric details for the purpose of immigration, security and criminality checks.