7 billion in 2023-24. The hotel population has contracted sharply — down by a third since December, when 30,657 migrants were being put up at public expense. The current hotel population figure stands at 20,800.
Eleven more hotels have been returned to commercial use in the latest round of closures. The latest round of hotel closures cut running costs by almost £65 million a year. Ten thousand asylum seekers have been cleared out of hotels and rehoused in shared accommodation and repurposed military sites.
That's despite the Government shunting people from hotels into residential apartments to hide what is going on.
The people leaving hotels are going into houses of multiple occupation or onto large consolidated sites. Expanding the network of large sites — particularly those on former military land — was central to the Government's plan. Two former defence installations are among those now in use: Crowborough Army camp in East Sussex, accommodating up to 350 people, and RAF Wethersfield outside Braintree in Essex, where the population has reached close to 1,300.
Opposition critics have challenged the government's approach. Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said the Government had simply moved asylum seekers sideways rather than removing them. According to Daily Express - UK News, Chris Philp described the government as shunting people from hotels into residential apartments to hide what is going on.
Those apartments are then not available for young people struggling to get on the housing ladder.
According to Daily Express - UK News, Chris Philp described most asylum seekers as illegal immigrants, and said Keir Starmer has let in more small boat illegal immigrants than any prime minister in history, with numbers 45 percent up since the election. Chris Philp further argued that leaving the European Convention on Human Rights — allowing illegal immigrants to be deported within days of arrival — was the only genuine solution, and Labour lacks the resolve to pursue it. He also claimed that when measured against the position at the time of the last general election, the hotel population was still higher than it was when Labour came to power — undermining the Government's claim to have turned the situation around.
A historic hotel in Cheshire with ties to the Royal Family will close its doors to asylum seekers next month. All residents of The Crewe Arms Hotel are set to be relocated to alternative sites and, where possible, to 'more appropriate dispersed accommodation'.
Most asylum seekers are illegal immigrants. Keir Starmer has let in more small boat illegal immigrants than any prime minister in history, and numbers are 45 per cent up since the election.