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Date submitted

23 July 2026

Submitted by

Interested party

Dear Planning Inspectorate, REF: Objection to Campsfield House IRC expansion, CROWN/2026/0000004 I am writing to raise a formal objection to the proposed expansion of Campsfield House Immigration Removal Centre. My name is Dr Chrysi Andriani Papaioanou, a writer and independent scholar in the theoretical humanities – and a proud Londoner who was born and raised in Athens, and who is now a dual Greek-British citizen. I am writing to object to the expansion of Campsfield House IRC, as I am deeply concerned about the multiple forms of harm – especially human harm – caused by detention, and about several factors concerning this particular planning application which I believe need to be brought to public scrutiny. There are some serious concerns about the veracity of the information that has been provided by the Home Office. Indeed, key information appears to have been withheld or redacted regarding the site’s operation – including lighting, landscaping, noise pollution, drainage, visual impact – especially when the claim that this area should not be treated as Green Belt appears to not be substantiated by a justification for the Such a proposal of a permanent development on protected land requires the closest possible scrutiny. There are several questions that remain unanswered, among which: 1) Why are these additional 240 detention places needed at Campsfield specifically? 2) What is the precise evidence that existing capacity is insufficient? 3) Why is this proposal using the argument of local job-creation in an identified for high-value employment and economic growth where jobs in science, technology, research, innovation could contribute positively to local lives and to the environment? 4) How will traffic, the local road network, and transport be affected by this expansion, considering the area is already facing significant development pressures from other construction projects? The Home Office should be required to explain: • why existing IRC capacity is not enough; • what alternatives have been considered; • why the expansion has to happen at Campsfield; • why permanent development on Green Belt land is justified. This matters because the Home Office is relying on claimed need to justify development that would otherwise cause serious planning harm, including harm to Green Belt land. If the need for more detention places has not been properly evidenced, the Home Office has not shown that the harm to the Green Belt is justified. The expansion should not be approved. I would like, therefore, to request that the Planning Inspectorate refuse this application and that, after the consultation closes and, if the application is not refused, that a full public enquiry is undertaken, so that the serious questions about the lack of sufficient evidence from the Home Office as well as the devastating human harm and environmental harm caused to the Green Belt are examined in public. Yours faithfully, Dr Chrysi Andriani Papaioannou