AVID Visitor Handbook
  • Welcome
  • Introduction
    • About AVID
    • About this Handbook
  • Getting started as a visitor
    • Introduction
      • Why Visit People in Detention
      • The Role of a Visitor
      • Joining a visitor group
    • Practicalities of visiting
      • Models of visiting
      • Booking a social visit
      • What to expect on arrival
      • What to expect in a visiting room
      • What to expect in prisons
      • How do people in detention find out about visitors?
    • Visiting Skills
      • Being worthy of trust
      • Empathetic listening
      • Demonstrating independence
      • Boundaries and safeguarding
    • What issues might someone raise and what can I do?
    • Step-by-step: Before, during and after a visit
    • Find a visitor group
    • Useful organisations
    • Visitor wellbeing
  • Who can be detained
    • Introduction
    • Who, Why, When
    • Decisions to Detain
    • Lawfulness of Detention
    • People considered unsuitable for detention
    • Demographics
  • Immigration Detention in the UK: Essential Legislation, Policy and Guidance
    • Introduction
    • Essential Immigration and Asylum Law for Visitors
      • UK legislation on asylum and detention
      • International Framework
      • Claiming asylum in the UK
      • Post Brexit Changes
    • Detention Policy and Guidance
      • Overview and Sources
      • Detention General Instructions
      • Detention Centre and Short-Term Holding Facility Rules
      • Detention Operating Standards
      • Detention Service Orders
      • Home Office Policy and Guidance
        • Adults at Risk Policy (AAR)
      • Prison Service Instructions & Probation Orders
      • High-concern areas of Home Office policy and guidance
        • The use of segregation
        • Age disputes in detention
        • Adults at Risk Policy and Rule 35/Rule 32
      • What can visitors do?
  • Immigration detention in the prison estate
    • Introduction
    • Legal Framework
    • Why are people detained in the prison estate?
    • History of the use of prisons to detain people held under immigration powers
    • Additional layers of disadvantage
    • Criticisms on the use of Prison for Immigration Detention and Further Reading
    • Organisations offering legal advice & practical help in prisons
  • Legal Advice and Representation
    • Introduction
    • Legal Advice and Representation
      • Why do people in detention need legal advice?
      • What is legal aid and what does it cover?
      • Who can give immigration legal advice?
      • The Legal Aid Agency Detention Duty Advice Scheme in IRCs
      • How do I know if a solicitor is doing a good job?
    • What can visitors do?
      • Finding a legal advisor
      • Finding a legal advisor for a person detained under immigration powers in the prison estate
      • Notify a legal representative that their detained client has been moved to another IRC
      • Help a person in detention to understand what they can reasonably expect of their lawyer
      • Give Information
      • Visitors and legal advisors: constructive relationships
      • Help if there are problems with the current legal representative
      • Acting as a McKenzie Friend
  • Getting out of detention
    • Introduction
    • Immigration Bail Overview
      • Secretary of State Bail
      • Immigration Tribunal Bail
    • Bail addresses and Home Office accommodation
    • Offering financial condition supporters/sureties
    • Refusal of bail and further bail applications
    • Bail with or without a legal advisor
    • Bail for people detained in the prison estate
    • Bail and removal directions
    • What can visitors do?
    • Life after release
  • Removal, Return, and Deportation
    • Introduction
    • Definitions
    • Being ‘liable to removal’ or ‘liable to deportation’ and Notices
    • Third Country Removals
    • Deportation
    • Getting on the plane
    • Assisted Voluntary Returns Schemes
    • Family Returns Process
    • Consequences of being removed or deported for return to the UK
    • What can visitors do?
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Visitors and legal advisors: constructive relationships

PreviousGive InformationNextHelp if there are problems with the current legal representative

Last updated 3 months ago

If the person has a solicitor or an accredited immigration advisor, it is essential that any contact between them and the visitor is constructive, and nothing is done that could undermine the relationship between the representative and their detained client. “A visitor who is engaged in advising or assisting a person in detention with the same matter upon which a lawyer is acting for the client risks breaking the relationship between client and lawyer.” [1]

As a visitor, your relationship with a person in detention's solicitor may be one of actively working in partnership or more likely will take the form of occasional contact. A solicitor does not have an obligation to take your calls or provide you with any information on the work they are doing (or not doing) for their client. As a visitor you are not their client, and they will likely be pushed for time to provide an update or discuss a case with you. If you can provide them with support or assistance that they need, perhaps gathering essential information for them that they are no longer funded under legal aid to collect, then they are more likely to make time to speak to you or will write to you.

Understanding each other’s roles is central to being able to work in harmony for the benefit of the detained person.

[1] ILPA, (2008), How visitors and lawyers may work together. Notes accompanying a discussion at AVID coordinators conference 2008.

Resource Tip

These notes from a previous AVID conference were made available by ILPA on how visitors and lawyers can work together - https://ilpa.org.uk/how-visitors-and-lawyers-may-work-together-june-2008/. Some suggested ways that visitors can support lawyers are:

  • Providing emotional and relational support which lawyers do not have capacity to provide.

  • Identifying client needs with which the lawyer can help or which are relevant to the case on which the lawyer is acting.

  • Setting expectations and helping someone to understand the limits and scope they can reasonably have in respect to their lawyer.

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