image by @ReeceWykes
Some 200 of the most vulnerable children in England and Wales are held in secure children’s homes. The law prohibits staff from using pain-inducing restraint on children inside the homes. But outside the homes, on visits to court, hospital or a family funeral, pain-inducing restraint is permitted for those children who are remanded or sentenced. What’s more, children can be locked into a “waist restraint belt”. In relation to immigration deportation, the prisons inspectorate has warned the waist restraint belt can be used like a “body belt”, the most extreme form of restraint available in prison, and very rarely used.
