Barnardo’s: Incarcerating children wrong and unnecessary

Martin Narey, chief executive of children’s charity Barnardo’s greets the news that detention of the children of failed asylum seekers will end by May on the Today programme:

“Incarcerating children is something you should do only after the most careful thought. Incarcerating children who have committed a crime is bad enough.

“Some of these are very, very young children indeed.

“Putting them in essentially a prison environment with barbed wire and bars and locks is not something you should do. It’s very, very damaging to the children indeed. It’s also unnecessary.”