We have in this book looked at the concept of concentration camps and examined the way in which they evolved over the course of the twentieth century. Far from being somehow associated with the excesses of the Third Reich, we have seen that concentration camps have been a part of British history from 1900 onwards. If any country justly deserves to have its name linked with the development and use of concentration camps; that nation is Britain, rather than Germany. Since the end of the Second World War and the revelation of the horrors of the Holocaust though, nobody has wanted to be seen making use of concentration camps and so the British have used a variety of euphemisms for such places; prisoner of war camps, internment camps and New Villages being some of these. Occasionally, the cat has been let out of the bag when a government Minister like Merlyn Rees casually refers to a ‘concentration camp’, but this has been rare. Whatever the name used, the essential purpose of the concentration camp has remained unchanged. They are used to gather together people whom a regime feels are its enemies or who might perhaps aid those enemies, in one convenient spot, where they can be supervised and observed. This is done without any of the tiresome restraints such as bringing people to trial or even allowing them access to courts. A disturbing aspect of the situations at which we have looked is that these supposed enemies of the regime have, in the case of the British, almost invariably been members of various ethnic groups: Jews, Chinese, Africans, Germans or Irish.
The British seem, since the freeing of their last political prisoners in 1975, to have fallen out of love with concentration camps. One only has to see the enormous fuss about holding terrorist suspects for twenty-eight days, a few years ago, the reverberations from which almost brought down a Prime Minister, to see how our views have changed over the last forty years, since the closing of the last British concentration camp. It is exceedingly unlikely that any future government of the United Kingdom will feel able to detain political prisoners or members of some ethnic minority without trial in the future; such are the sensitivities surrounding the matter. It is not only the expression ‘concentration camp’ which has now fallen from favour, but the very idea of holding people indefinitely without trial.
It is unlikely that many people will be found in this country who mourn the passing of British concentration camps; most would probably agree that such establishments have no place in the twenty-first century. All the indications are that they are likely to remain an historical curiosity.