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Date submitted

1 July 2026

Submitted by

Interested party

I strongly oppose the proposed expansion of Campsfield immigration detention centre. I have 14 years' professional and voluntary experience with people seeking asylum and refugees and know the impacts of 'housing' people in inhumane, prison-like conditions on mental health and wellbeing of people who have already experienced significant trauma and challenges prior to arriving in the UK. I also know that providing this accommodation as opposed to housing within communities leads to a lack of integration and community tensions, and ultimately costs the government more. Aside from the human impact, there are important planning considerations to be made: •It is totally inappropriate to expand the centre when the surrounding prestige Oxford University Technology Park extends right up to the very high fences of the centre. • Development has been allowed locally in this Green Belt area specifically for high-value employment, not the kind of jobs associated with detention. • The land planned to be built on has not been ‘previously developed’ (application documents). It is not ‘a commercial and industrial site’ but a residential one. • Other, e.g. visual (height of building) and traffic, considerations. • All relevant local elected councils, including the planning authority Cherwell, have made it quite clear that Oxfordshire people do not want this expansion, or indeed the immigration detention centre. • A public inquiry is required in view of the issue’s importance and contentiousness. I will not be available to attend a hearing.