Jobs aimed at improving the wellbeing of people at an immigration detention centre, including holding workshops in floristry and balloon craft, are unnecessary and should be removed, a government minister has said.
The outsourcing firm Mitie, which manages the Heathrow immigration removal centre (IRC) in west London, listed several roles online, including a painting and decorating tutor and gym manager, for salaries ranging between £31,000 and £38,000.
One of the job descriptions includes providing workshops in floristry, cake decorating, balloon craft, and arts and craft activities to “provide a safe, secure, stimulating, supportive and productive environment for residents”.
Mitie said it provided such roles to support the physical and mental wellbeing of the detainees and that they were highlighted by inspectors for helping people manage the stresses of detention.
After details of the roles emerged in the Sun newspaper, the Home Office minister Seema Malhotra said: “We do not believe all these roles are necessary and have told the Home Office to speak to Mitie to remove them.”
The Home Office has not clarified which roles it wants removed, and a number of them remain listed on the government’s find-a-job portal.
On its website, Mitie said it aimed to “treat those in our care with dignity, decency and respect” and provide an environment for residents to “engage in activities relevant to them”.
The care minister Stephen Kinnock said there had been “excessive interpretation” of contractual obligations. He told LBC: “My understanding of it is, they’re contractually obliged to have some kind of physical exercise, because you want to make sure that people aren’t falling into ill health, because that just makes it even worse for the taxpayer if we’re having to deal with that kind of thing.
“But it seems that there’s been an excessive interpretation of those contractual obligations and Seema Malhotra, the immigration minister, I’m very pleased to say, has rapidly responded to this and instructed Mitie to delete those jobs, and that is a good move on her part.”
The Heathrow IRC combines Colnbrook and Harmondsworth removals centres and is, according to Mitie, the largest IRC in Europe, with a capacity of 965 residents.
A spokesperson for the company said: “As part of our contractual obligations, we employ colleagues to run activities at Heathrow immigration removal centre to support the physical and mental wellbeing of detained individuals.
“The impact of these services was highlighted in the recent HMIP [HM Inspectorate of Prisons] report into Harmondsworth, which said that these provisions contributed to a greater overall focus on helping individuals to manage the stresses of detention.”
Last year, the watchdog labelled conditions at Harmondsworth the worst in the country, and the chief inspector of prisons, Charlie Taylor, described the “chaos” he found there as “truly shocking”.
