An exemption from detention pending deportation by Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) has so far shown little effect. It is about the so-called Orderly Return Act, which allows detainees to be detained in normal prisons until 2022. A survey by SPIEGEL in the federal states showed that no one has yet made use of this option.
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Most countries do not want to do this in the future either, only Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania are holding talks about this. Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia, on the other hand, have doubts about the compatibility with European law when jointly accommodating prisoners and detainees. In addition, there is often no space in normal prisons.
However, many countries are expanding their detention centers, such as Hessen, whose facility in Darmstadt is "almost fully occupied". The Hessian Ministry of the Interior complains that detentions have not been carried out repeatedly due to a lack of detention places.
The Federal Ministry of the Interior is therefore criticizing the federal states. It is feared that they "will not honor their promise to provide sufficient detention for returnees in the foreseeable future". Thorsten Frei, Union faction vice in the Bundestag, also calls on the states "to make use of all the possibilities that we have opened up for them with the migration package for repatriation".
Nationwide, forty percent of all deportations by air failed in 2019 by the end of October because those affected "could not be brought in". This affected 8040 of 20,079 deportations.
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