Burns Night 2007

I get a phonecall as I am walking in to open the Unity office. There is a blue sky and bright sunshine. A woman in Dungavel has a flight booked for her tomorrow, we need to get it stopped. I open up the office find her file and start learning about her story, Because her father was Christian and her mother Muslim the family had to leave their country for a neighbouring one but the authorities came and found them and shot her parents. She found her way to Britain and now has a 2 year old child born here who has no malaria protection and also is ill. I call the lawyer, I call Medical Justice people, I receive faxes.

There is a young man who is registering for the first time. His father has been here for 20 years is disabled, is a British Citizen and owns a house here. The man came here to care for his father as there is no other family. He still has to sign in at the Home Office every week.

A woman comes in with news. Her son who was being held in a local Glasgow police station has been released. He tried to go to Canada on false documents but was refused and returned. They wanted to charge him with a criminal offense but he said that it was an immigration case and he is not a criminal and he was only going there because he had been refused here and was just trying to find a place of safety.

A man comes in to register and mentions that he is a musician. He has a band called the Electric Chicken Feathers – you can check it out on his my space page.

I read a transcript of a Home Office interview with a friend. They asked him question after question. Why did you leave Sudan? My family were killed by Janjaweed, I would have been too. Why did you choose to come to Britain? I didn’t choose to come to Britain, I gave all my money to a man who said he could take me away to a safe place where I would find my wife and children. I spent a long time in a boat, I’m not a traveller kind of man. I found myself here. What happenned? I’m tired now, why do you ask me all these questions? Are you telling the truth? I don’t know how to lie, my soul is hurting. What is the name of the districts of Khartoum? When is the rainy season? That’s my job to know that, I’m a farmer. 3 hours worth. The painful bits were pushed, he didn’t want to talk about it.

A man talks about a friend also here from Sudan her husband a journalist disappeared.

A couple and their son bring in some delicious chapatis I devour.

The woman in Dungavel isn’t going tomorrow, there is a doctor’s appointment next week, here, that she can attend. After that is still very uncertain but relief for today.

Every few minutes somebody else comes in. Some just sign their names, nod and leave. Some hand over keys or bags to be looked after. Some stop to chat, some have questions. There is a board in the office with a list of names of the people who are being detained and information about them. People stand and look at the board, reading, asking if there is any more news.

Still January

When I arrive at the Unity office, my coat wet from the snow there are already a few people there. They have been there since 6am outside the Home Office protesting against dawn raids. I am brought up to date, make myself a drink and check the emails. Yesterday a woman and her 5 children were detained when they went to sign. She had fled her husband who tried to kill her and one of her sons. They have been here for 5 years and the children have been in the Scottish school system all this time. They are all in Dungavel detention centre.

It is quieter than usual but there is still a steady stream of people coming in to check in at Unity before signing at the Home Office.

A man comes in. His friend has been in Dungavel since early December. His wife and three children were too but they have been released. They paid a lawyer in London £2 500 to deal with the case and have had no receipt and little contact. I call the lawyer who says that he has faxed a barrister 2 days ago with the refusal notice and he is waiting to hear back from him and once he has he can put in for a judicial review and after that apply for bail. That's the procedure he says. Oh, and he has sent one other fax to a doctor to get some evidence about the man in detention's wife's depression. The friend stood wondering what to do next for a time and I wondered too, not knowing. He shakes my hand, says thank you and leaves.

A woman leaves her baby asleep in his pram while she goes to sign.

A photographer calls asking me if I know if it is possible to take photographs in Dungavel, I'm not sure.

I really need to pee but the toilet is in a separate entrance to the building and I can't leave the baby. A tall man with jeans on comes in, he is familiar to me. Is there anything you need, I ask. He says, I need to go to the toilet. I snap back, me too. He says, you first, I grab the keys and go.

A man comes in for a letter of support but the printer is broken so he waits while I try to email the letter to other places to print so he can pick it up and send it away today, it's urgent.

The baby is starting to get restless. Everybody returning from the Home Office is complaining about how busy it is, how long they have to wait in line to sign their name to say they are still here where they want to be.

A family comes in and they are anxious. It is the first time that they have all been called to sign together. They ask questions, is this normal, what will happen? They set off, I look at their file and panic because the lawyer's phone number isn't there. I call them on their mobile and get the number before they get to the Home Office.

The woman whose daughter was in Britain and then sent back to Africa without them seeing each other comes in. There has been a lot of hope with her situation the last few months because she has telephone contact with her daughter for the first time in years but there have been legal difficulties this week, set backs. "One day I'll live a happy life", she says and cries quietly.

The wife and children of the man in Dungavel come in. Her English is not good enough to fully understand what I can pass on about my phonecall with the lawyer. She calls the friend who explains. She nods and leaves.

The baby starts crying and I go and sit by him. Not long after his mother bursts in. I'm so sorry, so sorry, I'm grateful, she says to me. I'm so sorry, you must be hungry, to her son. Her anxiety is heightened, disproportionate to her baby's distress.

The tall man wearing jeans comes rushing back. It's taking too, too long today, forty people in front of me, can I call my wife I was supposed to meet her, she'll be worried. I am worried too, about the family who went together. It is well after five o'clock and it is only them and one other person due back. They arrive with smiles and cross their names off the list.

mid - January 2007

It's a cold windy day. I walk past the Home Office building to get to the Unity Centre and on the street between the two I see several solitary figures walking head down. Some I recognise, some I don't but they are unmistakably going to sign in, faces hardened and resigned, worried.

I arrive in the office and it is crowded. A couple are sitting on the sofa, a volunteer beside them writing on a form. Two people are standing in front of the desk writing their names down, two people are behind the desk talking. Two men are huddled over a form in the other corner. I climb over, move past and round the people and put my jacket on a chair at the back.

One of the men greets me with a hug, happy new year, it's been too long. It is the man from Sudan who is translating for a new arrival, a young man from Palestine. We take his details and then those of a man from Iraq who has also recently arrived. The three of them share a joke in Arabic, I look up with questioning eyes looking for a translation and am given some word of reassurance.

Meanwhile the couple have left. Their country of origin will not take them back, their claim for asylum here has been refused and they have no travel documents. A Scottish woman who lives besidet the centre is being helped to sort out a problem with the electricity in her flat.

The man from Sudan tells me about his week. The Home Office officials came to get him and took him in a van to Liverpool. He says that he made trouble. He asked to stop the van so he could pee. When they asked him his religion he said he has none. He refused translators because he didn't trust them. They did a medical exam in Liverpool asked him more questions and then brought him back to Glasgow. He was pissed off about it, anxiously telling and retelling the story until I understood what had happenned.

People come and go, can you look after these keys, this phone, this bag. The office is constantly busy. People who are early for their signing time at the Home Office sit and wait. New arrivals rummage in the back room and take clothes that have been donated to us. The landlord comes in for the overdue rent. A man tells me his story to write up to increase publicity about his case.

Today I spoke with a civil engineer, a nurse, the captain of a boat and many more whose profession I didn't ask. I saw their registration cards with their photographs and "employment prohibited" typed on them.