Asylum Centre Beside Sewage Works: Is This Britain's Worst Detention Plan?

The Home Office is pressing ahead with plans to expand Campsfield House immigration removal centre in Oxfordshire despite Thames Water warning that detainees housed in proposed new accommodation blocks just 20 metres from a sewage pumping station should expect insect swarms, strong odours and maintenance noise. The proposals, which would raise capacity at the site near Kidlington from 160 bed spaces to 400, are due to be examined at a public inquiry opening on 14 December, with Oxfordshire county council among those formally objecting.

Daily Dazzling Dawn understands the expansion forms part of a wider government ambition to enlarge the immigration detention estate by 40 per cent, a policy the Home Office insists is central to removing those with no right to remain in the UK.

In a written submission lodged in October, a senior development manager at Thames Water set out a catalogue of amenity problems that any inhabitants of the new secure accommodation blocks could face. The company wrote that the proximity of the pumping station could give rise to "amenity effects, including odour, noise, vibration, lighting associated with maintenance activities, insects and flies." A separate consultation response, submitted in June, warned that the development may lead to sewage flooding in the surrounding area and called for an impact study to establish "with a greater degree of certainty" whether the proposals would overload existing infrastructure. Thames Water also raised concerns about capacity within the foul water, surface water and water supply networks locally. The company said it had nothing to add to its response when approached.

The warnings have been seized upon by campaigners opposing the expansion. Ally Swadling, lead legal education officer at the charity Right to Remain, said the concerns demonstrated how little regard was being given to basic standards of sanitation and human dignity. She argued the correspondence reinforced the view that political priorities were being placed above the lives and wellbeing of people held at the site.

Campsfield House has a long and contested record. The centre reopened in December 2025 after being shut in 2018 following years of problems, including suicides, riots, escapes and complaints about conditions. The current proposals would convert existing buildings as well as adding new accommodation, significantly increasing the number of people detained at the site.

Oxfordshire county council has lodged a formal objection, arguing that the expansion risks intensifying existing public concern and calling for the site to be shut permanently. The council's opposition places it alongside local residents and advocacy groups ahead of next month's inquiry.

Imran Hussain, director of external affairs at the Refugee Council, told journalists that detention is a harmful and dehumanising experience that should only ever be used as a last resort. He said the evidence shows it is ineffective, expensive and damaging to those forced to endure it, and urged ministers to pursue community-based alternatives which he described as proven, effective and considerably cheaper.

A Home Office spokesperson said the department was confident in its plans for Campsfield and would continue to engage constructively with the Planning Inspectorate as the process moves forward. The spokesperson added that expanding detention capacity plays an important role in increasing the removal of those with no right to remain in the UK. According to Home Office figures, nearly 80,000 people have been returned or deported from the UK since the 2024 election up to the end of June 2026, an increase of 52 per cent on the previous two years.

The dispute places the department in an awkward position: it must satisfy the Planning Inspectorate that the site is suitable while confronting a statutory consultee's written warnings about sanitation, flooding risk and water network capacity. The public inquiry, beginning on 14 December, will hear representations including Thames Water's submission before a decision is reached.

For residents of Kidlington and campaigners across Oxfordshire, the inquiry represents the sharpest test yet of whether the government's detention expansion can proceed in the face of documented infrastructure concerns. For the Home Office, the challenge is to demonstrate that a facility yards from a sewage pumping station can meet the standards expected of any government-run accommodation.