It’s the immigration version of who wants to be a millionaire, with the only contestants being those who own mediocre hotels.
Whilst few will want to book into a place where the service scores and online reviews can be summarised as “tourists beware”, there is one way to get your place full of paying guests: a call from the Home Office’s asylum accommodation provider.
If you get the call and agree the deal, all your rooms will be booked out for a contracted period, normally at least six months, and payment is effectively guaranteed by the taxpayer. No chasing these guests for payment.
The exact cost of asylum hotels in the UK varies depending on the location, but on average, the cost per asylum seeker per night in a hotel ranges from £100 to £150.
This amount includes accommodation, meals, and other services such as cleaning. It’s also not a short-term business option, with one prominent seafront hotel in Blackpool having been used by asylum seekers for the last three years.
The solution to ending the madness of asylum hotels staring us in the face – Kevin Foster
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No wonder one former caravan park owner is estimated to have become the first immigration billionaire, due to owning Clearsprings Ready Homes, the company which holds a Home Office contract for accommodating migrants.
Asylum hotels are the clearest sign of the failure of our asylum system. It is the thing which most irritates the public and during my time in the Home Office, it provoked near despair having to see them open. So why has this happened?
The Home Office is under legal duty to house those who would “otherwise be destitute” having claimed asylum. With pressures in the housing market and a backlog of decisions, plus a flood of small new boat arrivals, previous housing capacity gets overwhelmed, prompting “temporary” solutions like hotels having to be used.
Alternatives, like large (Greek-style) accommodation centres, are never welcomed by a local community or council.
Home Office Ministers have often lamented having to deal with the UK’s sclerotic planning process, whilst a Greek Minister can simply sign an order to give permission. These could accommodate thousands, help process claims more quickly and make it easier to remove people, yet any MP who backs them is rarely keen to have one in their constituency.
Getting the backlog down also reduces demand for hotels, but with refusals tied up in the court, a “backlog reduction” process which is a rubber stamp for approving claims, simply attracts even more across the Channel. It also drops the problem of housing onto local councils, already facing problems with an overstretched rental market.
Wanting to get rid of asylum hotels is the one thing which unites the left and right on immigration yet simply wishing the problem away will not deal with it.
Labour Ministers are already finding saying “smash the gangs” and “stop using hotels” is not ending this issue. Difficult policy decisions are the only option.
The offensive and unacceptable cost the taxpayer now bears for housing and processing illegal migrants is what drove the move to create the Rwanda plan.
Breaking the business model of the people smuggling gangs by providing an option of safe resettlement in a country which specialised in it, whilst deterring the economic migrants who get in a small boat because they would prefer to be in the UK.
What is needed to bring down the backlog, reduce the costs and end the madness of asylum hotels? A comprehensive solution to the small boat’s crisis.
President Trump is implementing one for the USA’s Southern Border Crisis. The same approach is needed here.