Borders watchdog casts doubt on Labour pledge to end asylum hotels
The Labour government’s pledge to end the use of hotels for asylum seekers by 2030 has been dismissed as unachievable by the UK’s borders watchdog.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves reiterated at the Spending Review nearly a fortnight ago that the government’s commitment to end asylum hotels would save the government £1bn a year.
But David Bolt, the chief inspector of borders and immigration, told senior MPs on Tuesday that the growing backlog of cases and appeals could undermine government targets.
He told the Justice and Home Affairs Committee that the lack of housing available to relocate asylum seekers made ending the use of asylum hotels more difficult.
In response to a question on what it would take to end the use of hotels, Bolt said: “I don’t think it will be achieved, frankly.”
“I think there’s a more fundamental issue about accommodation, or at least housing stock, there simply isn’t sufficient housing stock to be able to deal with the sorts of numbers in the system.
“I think it’s really, really challenging.”
The National Audit Office said expenditure on hotels could reach £15.3bn over the next decade if the policy continues, which is triple the estimates originally pencilled in by Treasury officials.
Reeves said in mid-June that the policy to end contracts for hotels accommodating asylum seekers would help the government deliver a current budget balance by 2030.
Asylum seekers cost taxpayers
Official figures showed the government planned to spend £2.2bn of its aid budget on hotels.
Oxford University’s Migration Observatory calculated the daily cost of housing an asylum seeker in a hotel to have been £132 per person in 2023, compared to just £19 for other types of accommodation.
Researchers also found that the daily cost more than doubled in the three years after the pandemic.
Border security featured heavily in the government’s newly-published National Security Strategy, with National Crime Agency investigations into smuggling gangs overtaking those into drug trafficking for the first time, according to The Observer.
In the government’s blueprint for defence, officials signal they could have to “act outside our comfort zone” and take “extraordinary steps” to reinforce border security.
Bolt said that the government’s ambition to “smash the gangs” was unconvincing as criminals were determined to take risks in return for high rewards.
“I’m not sure I feel very optimistic about the ability to smash the gangs and, in any event, it seems to me, with organised crime, the best thing you can do is deflect it to something else you’re less concerned about rather than expect to eradicate it,” he said.
“The availability of illegal working – that, I think, is one of the issues the Home Office has tried to focus on and tried to close down as best it can and will continue to have to work very hard on that.”