Private companies awarded lucrative government contracts to run immigration detention centres in the UK are failing to properly train staff on the needs of LGBTIQ+ migrants, new documents reveal.
openDemocracy has reviewed diversity and equality training slides for staff at immigration removal centres run by Serco and Mitie, two of the UK’s biggest immigration service providers. The slides wrongly refer to the migrant people who are held in the centres while awaiting deportation or release, many of whom are very vulnerable, as “prisoners”.
And while the training materials, which were obtained by London-based charity Rainbow Migration under Freedom of Information laws, educate staff on how to recognise and combat racism, they often fail to offer equivalent information on tackling homophobia or addressing the specific vulnerabilities of LGBTIQ+ detainees. Not all of the training materials are dated, but those that are say they were created between 2018 and 2024.
The findings have added fresh urgency to Rainbow Migration’s calls for the government to end the detention of all LGBTIQ+ migrant people. The charity wants protections offered to trans and intersex people, who have been classed as ‘at risk of harm’ since 2016 and therefore should not usually be detained, extended to lesbian, gay and bisexual people.
“Lesbian, gay and bisexual people are supposed to be protected by the policies that are currently in place, but this FOI shows that even basic protections such as adequate DEI training for staff are not being implemented,” said Minesh Parekh, policy and public affairs manager at Rainbow Migration. “It also shows how LGBTQI+ people are let down by the disparity in protections across centres and between different private providers.”
Almost 500 people who identified as LGBTIQ+ were held in immigration detention between June 2022 and July 2024, according to a Freedom of Information request submitted by openDemocracy.
For many of these people, the removal centres’ prison-like conditions can trigger traumatic memories of the violence and discrimination they experienced back home, while they often endure homophobic bullying. This was the case for George*, who was detained after travelling to the UK to flee homophobia in his own country.
“It was the most lonely feeling,” George said. Fellow detainees discovered he was gay when a staff member at the centre left his personnel file, which detailed his sexuality and his experiences of homophobia, on a desk. “I was beaten, violently harassed and bullied for a long time after,” he said. “Staff didn’t care. It felt like a prison. I had nightmares for months afterwards.”
Detainees have to share rooms with strangers, including those who hold homophobic views. This was the experience of Joel Mordi, a gay man from Nigeria who was detained at Harmondsworth immigration removal centre, near London’s Heathrow Airport, for five days on arrival to the UK.
“The physical conditions were bad enough, but the mental strain was even worse,” Mordi said. “Power imbalances were rife amongst fellow detainees. As an LGBTQ+ person, the threats and dangers inside were ever-present. Homophobic bullying and harassment were common. It felt like there was no escape from the prejudice and violence that had driven me from my home in the first place.”
“There is no doubt that LGBTQ+ people are in danger in immigration detention,” Ayesha Aziz, legal services manager at Rainbow Migration. “It’s very serious in terms of the harms LGBTQ+ people face and the dangerous lengths they go to hide their sexual orientation.
“I recently visited a man who was so scared of being outed that he would hide his face under a hooded top as he feared being outed based on how others perceived his demeanour, he would not speak to anyone, and he could not sleep because he was so afraid of being abused or attacked for his sexual orientation. He was afraid his roommate suspected he was gay and would attack him at night. He was in detention for 50 days.”
The Home Office did not respond to a request for comment.
The training
While almost all of the diversity and equality training materials obtained by Rainbow Migration mentioned LGBTIQ+ detainees, they often lacked detailed information about their specific needs and failed to consider how immigration detention can itself harm them.
In 2023, Serco won a nine-year contract worth £69.5m to run Derwentside in County Durham – the UK’s only women-only immigration removal centre. The following year, a report by the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB), the watchdog tasked with inspecting detention centres, found that “a significant proportion of the detained women” it houses are vulnerable, and some are “extremely vulnerable”.
Yet training that Serco provided to the centre’s staff referred to it as a “prison” and detainees as “prisoners”. It also focused on the wellbeing of LGBTIQ+ staff members, rather than detainees, and failed to offer information on how to protect LGBTIQ+ detainees from unlawful discrimination. Some of the materials, including a quiz and mid-course assessment, did not mention LGBTIQ+ people at all.
Since 2007, Serco has also run Yarl’s Wood, a former women-only immigration detention centre in Bedfordshire, near Luton Airport, which became notorious for allegations of staff abusing women detainees during the 2010s. The centre now houses both men and women facing deportation.
A 113-page slide deck offering equality and diversity training to Yarl’s Wood staff repeated the same issues as in Derwentside, with references to “prison” and “prisoners”, and a focus on unlawful discrimination against staff rather than the specific needs of LGBTQ+ detainees.
The most recent publicly available report on an IMB inspection of Yarl’s Wood, published in summer 2023, suggests most LGBTIQ+ detainees at the centre did not feel able to tell staff about their sexuality. “A quarter of detainees responding to our survey said they were gay, bisexual or of other sexual orientation, although only about 8% of detainees had disclosed this to the centre,” it says.
Training for staff at two other centres, Brook House and Tinsley House, which Serco won a £200m contract to run for eight years in 2020, notably offered good and supportive advice to staff on how to direct detainees to LGBTIQ+ support services and create a positive, safe environment for LGBTIQ+ people. This included instructions on ensuring residents are aware that homophobia is not tolerated.
But there was still little mention of how to identify homophobia, compared to more detailed information on recognising racist behaviour.
A Serco spokesperson said: “We welcome feedback in relation to equality, diversity and inclusion training for our staff at immigration removal centres and continually review course materials to ensure they reflect best practice.”
Mitie has a 10-year contract worth £525m to deliver immigration services, including running the immigration removal centres at Harmondsworth and Colnbrook, in the south of England, and Dungavel in Scotland. As with the training delivered to Serco staff, Rainbow Migration identified numerous issues with the training that Mitie provided to staff at these centres – as well as some positives.
One exercise asked trainees to identify which language was discriminatory, using terms such as “ladyboy” and “homo”, as well as “queer” and “gay”. Information did not address the specific needs of LGBTIQ+ people, or used outdated or incorrect terminology such as “intersexual” rather than “intersex”. Some of the materials, such as a handout where trainees were asked to identify types of discrimination in given scenarios, and a handout focused on culture, failed to mention LGBTQ+ people.
A spokesperson for Mitie said: “Inclusion is an important part of our culture and this specific training, delivered in our immigration removal centres, is just one element of our broader commitment to inclusion. We recognise that this is an evolving area and the materials are being reviewed and will be updated to reflect current best practice.”
But even when a company such as Serco or MItie provides training that has positive interventions on tackling homophobia, the documented harms to LGBTIQ+ people in immigration detention raises questions as to whether they should be held in these spaces at all.
“Staff in detention centres are not properly trained and may themselves be homophobic,” warned Rainbow Migration’s Ayesha Aziz. “This lack of proper training means LGBTQ+ people are scared to report abuse to the staff. Many people are so afraid of being outed that they avoid seeking legal support, making it even harder for them to apply for asylum or be released from detention. The practical risk of harm is so high. LGBTQ+ people are not being protected by the immigration system in its entirety.”
*Names have been changed
