Nearly 40% of Asylum Seekers Housed at Controversial Ex-RAF Site Are Torture Victims

Nearly 40% of asylum seekers living at a former military site in Essex are survivors of torture, meaning they are not fit to live at the site, campaigners have warned.

New research by Doctors of the World and Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) reveals that 39% of the 580 asylum seekers (226) housed at RAF Wethersfield, in Braintree, survived torture.

The two organisations are calling for the site to be closed, warning it “feels like a prison and it looks like a prison”, and further suggest it is not equipped to deal with mental health difficulties.

They also warned, in a briefing to media last month, that many of the asylum seekers are stuck wearing flip-flops and “very thin jumpers”, as temperatures fall below freezing in parts of the UK. 

The site has been condemned as unsafe since it opened in 2023, particularly after a report by the Ministry of Defence – published earlier this year – warned that Wethersfield is home to unexploded ordinance and radiological contamination due to how it was previously used.

Jacob Burns, UK operations migration project manager at MSF, said asylum seekers at Wethersfield tend to be “incredibly vulnerable” because of what they experienced in their home countries, and during their migration route to the UK.

“Then they’re being re traumatised again by being housed in a place like Wethersfield, which feels like a prison,” he told Byline Times.

According to research by MSF and Doctors of the World, one in four people at Wethersfield have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), while 41% have experienced suicidal thoughts while at the site.

More than 70% of the men who attend a mobile clinic at Wethersfield — run by Doctors of the World  — have shown signs of “severe psychological distress”, the charity found.

The media briefing also included testimony from three residents at Wethersfield, one of whom said they knew of ten people who had tried to take their own lives while there.

“I feel like I’m always in an empty, dark place, because I don’t know what is going to happen,” the 23-year-old man said.

In Wethersfield, they mentally torture you, it’s like they play a game with your mental health.

asylum seekers at Wethersfield

He added that is very isolating, as it is a half hour walk to the nearest town, saying: “We cannot do anything, just be here – they do not treat us like human beings, from the day we arrive.”

The man, who gave an anonymous testimony, added that he had “lost my chance of having a life”.

Up until late 2023, torture and rape survivors could not be housed at sites like Wethersfield. But, in January, a Home Office policy change meant it could still send them to those sites if it decided there was a proportionate amount of support available.

During the briefing, the organisations also flagged concerns over the cold – weeks after snow fell in parts of south Essex. In mid-November, the Met Office issued a yellow weather warning for ice across the east of England, including all of Essex.

“We’re very worried [about the cold],” said Dr Emma Withycombe, who runs the mobile clinic and is a doctor and medical activity manager at Doctors of the World. 

Most of the asylum seekers living at Wethersfield – all single men – are sent to the site “very quickly after they arrive in the UK”, she said. That leaves a lot of them with very unsuitable clothing or limited to Home Office clothing.

We definitely see people come to our clinic dressed very inappropriately, wearing flip flops, very thin jumpers, and with no raincoats in the pouring rain

Dr Emma Withycombe, Doctors of the World

In one of the testimonies provided, a 41-year-old man said it was already “not a quiet place, not a safe place”, even with reduced capacity.

“It’s having a real impact on my health, the lack of freedom, it’s impacting my sleep,” he added.

Though some charities – such as Care4Calais – provide some warm clothes, the more people there are in the camp, the less there is go around.

There are plans to increase the site’s capacity, which was limited to 580 but is now set to rise to 800, with a “surge capacity” of 1,220.

In April, the Home Office received planning permission to increase Wethersfield’s capacity to 1,700, though it said it would cap regular occupancy to 800 to “maintain absolute focus on service delivery”.

To get the extra planning permission, the department carried out surveys of the ground condition, after concerns were raised about the “presence of toxic substances in the soil and groundwater” at the site, after it was used for military training for several decades. 

But there are still concerns that the site is not safe enough for the capacity to be expanded, and that funding to support the asylum seekers – already limited – will be further stretched if the capacity is further increased.

Maria Wilby, director and operational lead at Refugee, Asylum seeker & Migrant Action (RAMA) – a local refugee support organisation which primarily works with asylum seekers living in places like Colchester –  told Byline Times that she is concerned there will be no extra funding to help support the extra asylum seekers.

“If there are now going to be 800 people instead of 580, who are going to be bussed to Chelmsford, to Colchester and to Braintree during the week, it will have a significant impact on those areas,” she said.

“None of us will get funding for that, and we will just be left dealing with people who don’t feel that they can even reach the welfare teams on site.”

Currently, two members of her staff are supporting asylum seekers housed at Wethersfield for half a day, by giving out SIM cards. Wilby doesn’t think she will be able to continue doing that, as the number of asylum seekers RAMA is supporting in towns in Essex is set to more than double to 600 in early 2025.

She also claimed that, of the £2.5 million handed to the local Braintree District Council to support asylum seekers at Wethersfield, it had only spent £50,000 so far, on activities, most of which are now over.

“It is a tiny drop in the ocean, and so much more could be done,” she said.

Leader of Braintree District Council, Councillor Graham Butland, said the Home Office grant was for the council and Essex County Council to “fulfil their statutory responsibilities relating to the site, as set out in the grant instruction. This has been clearly communicated with voluntary and community sector (VCS) organisations.” 

“Despite that, we did allocate some funding for VCS activity onsite as an interim arrangement due to an acute need at the time; to give the Home Office and Clearsprings the time they required to commission their own arrangements for activity and support for service users.”

Butland said any “non-statutory spend must be agreed with the Home Office and we have been working for over a year to request permission to spend funds on areas that impact the community as a result of the site.

“Despite our consistent opposition to the asylum centre due to its isolated location, the lack of capacity in local services and the scale of development, we, along with other partners continue to seek assurances from the Home Office and their contractors that Wethersfield is a safe site and is as self-sufficient as possible.” 

During the briefing, the experts also warned that sites like Wethersfield “are not the answer” to housing asylum seekers. 

Though the Home Office (then run by the former Conservative Government) expected to save around £94 million by using “large sites” like Wethersfield, rather than hotels, the National Audit Office in March found that, actually, it would cost £46 million more.

Anna Miller, head of policy and advocacy at Doctors of the World, added that, with just 4% of the UK’s asylum seekers residing at sites like Wethersfield, those and similar sites are not “practical solutions”.

She pointed out that, in March 2023, when the Home Office was housing 54,000 asylum seekers, Wethersfield and two similar sites were only housing 2,000 people – just over 4% of the total.

“I would really challenge the idea that the large sites are practical solutions, and that it is a cost-effective solution to this problem,” Miller said.

She did, however, welcome the current Government’s decision to close sites like Wethersfield, and the Bibby Stockholm in January.

Miller added that the Government’s push to process more asylum claims may have led to mental health getting “slightly better” in Wethersfield.

“The overall view is that people seeing other people having their claims processed, moving on and moving out of the site is beginning to give people more hope around the future.

“That is definitely a positive development that we very much welcome,” she explained.

Miller called for the Government to close Wethersfield as soon as possible, rather than move forward with plans to increase its capacity.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Though we have inherited an asylum system under unprecedented strain, we have taken immediate action to restart asylum processing which will save an estimated £4 billion for the taxpayer, ultimately reducing reliance on hotels and costs of accommodation.

“We remain absolutely committed to ending the use of hotels for asylum seekers and continue to identify a range of accommodation options to minimise their use.”