The Government is to review the contract of the controversial company running Campsfield House asylum centre after the escape of seven detainees and a riot.

As three illegal immigrants remained on the run tonight, the organisations responsible for the centre put up a wall of silence.

Immigration Minister Liam Byrne - the man leading the contract review - stonewalled the Oxford Mail's requests for an interview.

The Home Office refused to reveal details of its contract with Campsfield operators GEO UK, a subsidiary of a US company, even though the facility is funded by taxpayers.

GEO would not comment on the situation, despite the second breakout in less than a year from the detention centre, near Kidlington.

However, the Home Office did confirm GEO's contract would be reviewed by Mr Byrne following last Saturday's riot and Thursday's escape.

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Dr Evan Harriscorr, who will talk to Mr Byrne as part of the review, said: "I think this is a scapegoating exercise.

"It looks like the Home Office is trying to blame the company which it chose to run it.

"GEO run the centre according to a contract drawn up by the Home Office and the Home Office is supposed to be checking all the time.

"It's not for alleged culprit 1 to say it's alleged culprit 2."

Three failed asylum seekers - Mohammed Aref Hosseini, Abdesalam Tark Ben and Abdelhak Morid - were still on the loose when the Oxford Mail went to press.

They escaped early on Thursday - just days after prison officers were drafted in to quell a riot at the centre, in Langford Lane.

In August last year, 26 detainees escaped from Campsfield. Six remain at large.

GEO has refused to talk since the riot, but its website states it is in the third year of a three-year contract to manage the centre, which holds 218 people.

The Home Office refused to give guarantees the problems seen at Campsfield would not be repeated at a similar complex it plans to build near Bicester.

But in a statement, the UK Border Agency said: "We now remove someone from the United Kingdom every eight minutes. We need detention centres to help us do this, especially as we take a much tougher approach to deporting anybody who has broken the law in a serious way.

"Whenever we have an incident like this week's at Campsfield, we conduct a full review, including of our contractor GEO."