Scottish Detainee Visitors - 'Life After Detention'

We are very pleased to share a new film by our member group, Scottish Detainee Visitors, in collaboration with men and women who have experienced detention. In the film they share their experiences of life after immigration detention:

 

"The harm caused by detention does not end once a person is released. For many, the trauma of detention, and the struggles with uncertainty, continue". This is the subject of ‘Life After Detention’, a new film made in collaboration with the Life After Detention group from Scottish Detainee Visitors. The group filmed aspects of their life in Glasgow on their mobile phones and worked with film-maker and SDV volunteer, Alice Myers, to create the film. It was premiered at an Unlocking Detention event on Tuesday 12 December at the Glad Cafe in Glasgow.

 

The Life After Detention group are a group of experts by experience with first hand experience of the detention system. The group provides peer support, casework and a space for creative activity. They have published writing on SDV’s website, and have performed their work at SDV events, including at SDV’s joint meeting at the Scottish Parliament with UNHCR, Detention Action and the Detention Forum. The ten people in the Life After Detention group were detained for four years and eight months in total.

 

You can watch the film below, and through this link.

In the film, members of the group describe their experiences post-detention:

 

“Home Office, they have put fear inside us. It is really difficult to get rid of this fear. Sometimes it appears in dreams at night. Sometimes it comes in a different way during the day.”

 

“I’m not who I was three years ago. I felt very strong… now I don’t feel such strength. When you know lots of people around you, you think that they as a human, they have rights. But you don’t have rights as a human. So that is really painful, because then you realise that you are not human.”