Campaign supporter organisation call

The UK government is locking up thousands of children and their families in immigration detention centres. 2,000 children or more were detained in 2005.They had not committed any crime.

Children and their parents aren't told how long they will be detained for - it could be days or many months. For many of these families detention is particularly traumatic because they have come to the UK to escape terror in their own country, often at the hands of state officials.

For children, the effects of detention in the UK have been shown to be extremely damaging. Children feel they are being punished but don't understand why, often leaving them depressed and traumatised. Seven-year-old Sophie was detained with her mother and five-year-old brother. Her mother says,"She was crying all the time... and saying 'I'm going to kill myself.'"

Despite the fact that these families comply with immigration regulations and that viable alternatives have been trialled by governments overseas, the UK government has increased its use of immigration detention for children and families.

Refugee Council, Save the Children UK, Bail for Immigration Detainees, together with Scottish Refugee Council and Welsh Refugee Council have joined forces for the campaign.

We want your help to ensure that the UK government gets the message that detaining children for immigration purposes is wrong and that it should pursue alternatives to detention. The campaign has a website from which individuals can lobby the Home Secretary and their MP. Electronic messaging from the site only takes a minute.

Organisations can also request postcards from the coalition partners.

www.noplaceforachild.org.uk

How can your organisation support the campaign:

Ask your organisation to lend its public support to the campaign. This will be recorded on the campaign website.

Contact Campaign co-ordinator Anne Callaghan A.Callaghan@savethechildren.org.uk

or any campaign staff from the partners.

• If your organisation has any postal or electronic mailings prior to 30 June deadline, please include our campaign postcard or some detail about the campaign - such as the copy in this communication

• Create a link to www.noplaceforachild.org.uk on your organisation's website

• Request postcards or email out to your colleagues, friends, and family

• email A.Callaghan@savethechildren.org.uk for more copies of the postcard

Please note that the website generates an electronic action, so no postage is necessary for campaigners to act.

Thanks for your support