Application for Judicial Review is refused.
The latest news is that the family have now been refused their application for judicial review. They are now liable to be deported at any moment.
Every Child Matters?
“We passionately believe that every child matters”, says Cllr Harry Harpham, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services. “We want to make sure that every child, wherever they live and whatever their background, is growing up to be healthy, safe and with the opportunity to achieve.”
Claude and Majolie N'Deh, and their children Kirsty, Gael and Jason Cyril.
These children were arrested with their parents in a dawn raid by immigration police, taken from their home in soiled nappies and kept in a cell for seven days. Two of these children were denied essential twice-daily medication for the incurable disease they carry. If this family is deported to Cameroon, two of these children have up to 50% chance of seeing their fifth birthday, according to the World Health Organisation.
Twins Kirsty and Gael and their brother Jason Cyril were born in Jessops Hospital Sheffield. They were arrested with their family on Sunday 11th May and spent a week in detention in YarlsWood Detention Centre awaiting deportation to Cameroon.
The family were woken at 6am by 11 immigration police officers at their family home in Gleadless. They were taken away in their pyjamas and soiled nappies. The children were not allowed to be changed until late afternoon. At the detention centre, the family were held in a room with only two single beds. Jason and Kirsty, who suffer from sickle cell disease, were not given their prescribed medication until the Thursday afternoon, four days after their arrest. The children have never been to Africa and Cameroon is a high risk malarial area with under-fives vulnerable to malaria. Jason and Kirsty have a 50% risk of death in Cameroon because of their sickle cell disease.
Seven days after their arrest, the family was released following an application for judicial review of their claim. The children’s health suffered in detention and after the family were released Kirsty was kept overnight at Sheffield’s Childrens Hospital. The children have taken weeks to recover from the ordeal.
The application for a judicial review of their case has been refused and once more the family face imminent detention and deportation.
Britain has been strongly criticised for breaching human rights, and has opted out of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, yet one of the UK Government’s latest campaigns is Every Child Matters. Its aim is to keep children safe from harm. In its summary it states: “We all share a duty to do everything we can to ensure every child has the chance to fulfill their potential… to prevent children slipping through the net.” The Refugee Council of Great Britain said of the campaign in 2004: “‘Falling though the gaps’ is a phrase that could have been coined to describe the experience of asylum seeking children in the UK. It is therefore imperative that policies aimed at vulnerable children do not simply repeat previous mistakes – as a society we must rise to the challenge of protecting those hardest to protect.” In Tony Blair’s introduction to Every Child Matters, he writes that “(some) children’s lives are filled with risk, fear and danger.”
Children of asylum seekers face risk, fear and danger from the very Government that created this campaign.
Article 22 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child states:
“Parties shall take appropriate measures to ensure that a child who is seeking refugee status or who is considered a refugee in accordance with applicable international or domestic law and procedures shall…receive appropriate protection and humanitarian assistance in the enjoyment of applicable rights set forth in the present Convention and in other international human rights or humanitarian instruments to which the said States are Parties.”
JASON, GAEL AND KIRSTY NEED YOUR HELP.
- Email the Home Secretary at jacqui.smith@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk or write to Jacqui Smith MP Home Office, 2 Marsham Street, London SW1P 4DF
- Use this model letter as a basis for your own messages and letters.
- Print off THIS PETITION (MS Word Doc, 729Kb) and once full, please post to Jacqui Smith, 2 Marsham Street, London, SW1P 4DF
- Write to/email the Children’s Commissioner Sir Al Aynsley-Green at 11 MILLION, 1 London Bridge, London, SE1 9BG, info.request@11million.org.uk
- Email your contact details and copies of any letters you send to claude.campaign@activist.com and we will send you updates on the campaign
- For further information about action to stop the deportation of children, go to http://www.unicef.org.uk/campaigns/take_action/email_fax_your_mp/index.asp?action=33
Visit the National Coalition of Anti-deportation www.ncadc.org.uk for more information on campaigning and up-dates - E-mail Paul Scrivens leader of Sheffield City Council, “Where Everyone Matters”, and ask him to intervene to the Home Secretary on Claude’s behalf – paul.scriven@sheffield.gov.uk
- Invite Claude or one of his campaign group to speak at your community group, union meeting or event.
All correspondence must include the following details: Claude Ndeh. Majolie Ther, Yiah Cyril Jason, Kirsty Michel Tchos and Gael Lionel Atchom — Home Office reference number N1056909
