The Socialist 24 February 2010

NHS: not safe in their hands!

NHS: Not safe in their hands!

Private 'vultures' to run NHS hospital

How to stop cuts and defend public services

Demo opposes £29m Notts county cuts

Young people deserve a future: Join the Manchester march for jobs on 13 March

Youth Fight for Jobs Demonstrations

RMT branch supports challenge to Denham

Support the TUSC election challenge

Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition General Election launch rally

British Airways cabin crew v management: Round two

Anger on Teesside over Corus closure

ID cards - an expensive threat to civil liberties

Tories attack community café...

Yarl's Wood hunger strike

Fast news

The Eton co-op won't work

Nominate Roger Bannister: Unison's leadership battle

Unison witch-hunt continues

South Wales: Demo against council cuts

Staythorpe: the fight for workplace safety

Port workers battle bosses... and high court

Jobcentre staff fight cuts

Leeds university: Support lecturers striking to save jobs

Fighting leadership needed for UCU

CWU women vote for political review

CWI Latin America school: A continent on the brink

Iraq: All eyes on the oil prize

Campaigning rights victory: But questions remain on new Waltham Forest policy

How can the racist BNP be defeated?

Scottish Defence League defeated: Working class political alternative urgently needed

Previous issues, etc

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Yarl's Wood hunger strike

UP TO 30 women detainees at Yarl's Wood detention centre in Bedfordshire are continuing a hunger strike. It began on 4 February in protest over their poor conditions, separation from their children, poor health and legal provisions and length of internment.

According to media reports, 20 of the women are facing serious health problems as a result of the hunger strike.

There are increasing calls for an urgent independent inquiry into the centre. As one detainee said: "We need our cases looking at. I have a little girl and am not a criminal but I have been locked up in here for 15 months and no one can tell me when that will change."

The home office and the camp's management deny mistreatment of the detainees, however, a recent report by the Children's Commissioner was highly critical of the conditions in which child detainees are kept.

Last year the commissioner published a report which stated that children held in the detention centre are denied urgent medical treatment, handled violently and left at risk of serious harm.

Yarl's Wood was opened in November 2001 and was built to hold up to 900 asylum seekers facing deportation.

Since then detainees at the controversial camp have repeatedly gone on hunger strike over their conditions and, in 2002, rioted. In 2004 an Ombudsman report was published into allegations of racism and assault on inmates. The following year, Manuel Bravo, an asylum seeker from Angola, hanged himself while in detention awaiting deportation with his 13 year old son.

In this issue

NHS: Not safe in their hands!