No deal yet on closure of Newcastle asylum seeker hotel
No deal has yet been reached on the closure of a Newcastle asylum seeker hotel, amid criticism that the Government has not set out a clear strategy for ending their use.
Newcastle City Council has said repeatedly over recent months that it is in active talks with the Home Office over shutting a city centre hotel currently being used to house asylum seekers, which has been the subject of regular protests.
While Labour has promised to stop the use of such hotels across the country by 2029, a committee of MPs has this week warned that ministers are yet to deliver a clear strategy for how it will replace the “current failed, chaotic and expensive” system.
The Home Affairs Committee found that the Home Office had “squandered” taxpayer money, with the expected costs of accommodation contracts for 2019 to 2029 having spiralled from £4.5 billion to £15.3 billion, while adding that making promises of closures to “appeal to popular sentiment” without setting out a clear alternative risks “undermining public trust still further”.
The Home Office later confirmed on Monday that two military sites in Scotland and southern England would temporarily be used to house around 900 asylum seekers, with officials seeking further sites to take pressure off hotels.
Council leader Karen Kilgour has previously called for local authorities to be handed more powers over where asylum seekers are placed, as part of a new system aimed at better protecting existing communities and integrating new arrivals.
She confirmed on Tuesday that talks with the Government remain ongoing, but cautioned that a deal to close the Newcastle hotel “won’t happen overnight and nothing has yet been agreed”.
The Labour councillor added: “I have made my position very clear on this matter and share the Government’s ambition to end the use of hotel contracts for asylum seeker accommodation. Not only because of the excessive cost to the taxpayer, but because it is simply not an appropriate way to house asylum seekers in the long term.
“Asylum seekers are not only single men who arrived on a boat, they are families, women, young children. They are vulnerable and have often faced unimaginable horror – this is something we cannot forget.
“Many are being made to share a small hotel room for months, if not years, while claims are assessed. This narrative that asylum seekers are staying in five star accommodation and gifted with mobile phones, cash and designer clothing is a myth.
“They receive support from charities and have less than £10-a-week as a basic allowance. They are not allowed to work and every day is uncertain, not knowing whether or not they can begin to rebuild their life.
“Those staying in a hotel in Newcastle have faced weekly protests and I find this incredibly sad. Although I understand there needs to be legitimate debate on immigration I do not think this approach is helpful.”
The chairwoman of the Home Affairs Committee, Dame Karen Bradley, said that the Government had to “get a grip on the asylum accommodation system” and that the Home Office “must finally learn from its previous mistakes or it is doomed to repeat them”.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The Government is furious about the number of illegal migrants in this country and in hotels.
“That is why we will close every single asylum hotel – saving the taxpayer billions of pounds.
“We have already taken action – closing hotels, slashing asylum costs by nearly £1 billion and exploring the use of military bases and disused properties.”