During the departure interview at the UKBA reporting centre, our situation took on deeper shades of Kafka. I could not be trusted with my own passport; our documents would be given to us at the airport departure gate. Want to complain? Help yourself to a form. This piece of paper might, I suppose, find its way into sympathetic hands and even be read and acted upon. I'm sceptical. 

The most maddening feature of the whole humiliating process was the universal shrugs by UKBA and Home Office personnel (who never seemed very sure which agency they actually worked for). 

Through the overgrown thicket of red tape, however, Britain's truer colours do shine through. The overwhelming response I got from friends and colleagues was genuine concern, support and embarrassment. "I apologise for my country," they would say. But they shouldn't have to, and it's a shame their government is making them do it.