The Use of Asylum Seeker Hotels Must End

Another day, another promise broken by Labour. At this point, there is only one thing that is increasing at a quicker rate than manifesto pledges that Labour have u-turned on – and regrettably, that is the number of hotels being stood up to house asylum seekers.

I campaigned hard to end the use of the Roman Way hotel in Cannock and the Hatherton House hotel in Penkridge. As such, you can imagine my anger and shock when, late on a Wednesday evening, my inbox lit up with an email from the Home Office, informing me that the Roman Way hotel would be put back into use.

Almost immediately, I wondered how many other hotels across the country would reopen, and which other communities would be affected. I started to ask around, but soon hit a roadblock: there was simply no information publicly available, no official announcement, no statement from the Home Secretary. Nothing.

So, I tabled an Urgent Question to the Home Secretary, insisting that she come before Parliament to tell the country what exactly is going on. Dragged kicking and screaming to the despatch box, the minister dug her heels in and refused to share the names of the hotels put back into use, nor whether she had a plan to reduce illegal migration, nor whether she would backtrack on any other manifesto pledges.

But what she did let slip was that 14 hotels have reopened since Labour entered Government. 14 hotels – that’s £8 million per day billed to the British taxpayer and £4.2 billion each year that could be used to keep pensioners warm or protect British farming. This is without even mentioning the negative impact this policy has on local economies, or how the parachuting of hundreds of young men into small communities damages residents’ sense of safety.

This is precisely why Starmer must come clean and tell us which hotels have been reopened and how long they will be in use for. Hiding this information in the hope that people won’t notice is not just an insult to the British public’s intelligence, it is an act of gaslighting on a national scale.

Many will argue that the hotels should not be named in order to prevent violence from breaking out in their vicinity. I disagree: local communities already know which hotels are in use because they have seen their bookings cancelled and busloads of young men milling around outside. If people wanted to cause trouble, they could do so already.

In fact, Labour’s decision to not publicly name the hotels increases the risk of violence. Residents in the areas affected have received no official information about the reopenings, and as the local MP, I received less than 36 hours’ notice. As a result, communities have found out through word of mouth, rumour and suspicion. If there is a better way to breed distrust, anger and resentment than Labour’s lack of honest communication, I have yet to see it.

The truth is that Labour’s plan isn’t working, and they know it. Since July, almost 20,000 people have crossed the channel on small boats, which is an increase of 23% on the figures for this time last year. In fact, the only thing that has stopped the boats since Labour came to power is Storm Bert – perhaps he can replace the Home Secretary at the next reshuffle.

It is not enough to target the “root causes” of migration, or to employ more civil servants to process claims faster. We need to stop the boats from reaching our shores, both by providing a deterrent such as the Rwanda scheme, or by removing incentives to make the crossing – incentives like free hotel accommodation.

But Starmer won’t do this. He will continue talking about “smashing the gangs”, posing for photo ops in lifejackets, and flying abroad to chit-chat about immigration with foreign leaders. All the while, the boats will carry on arriving and even more of your money will be wasted on hotels. So, I call on Keir to end the use of asylum seeker hotels – or at the very least, to be honest about the fact they are being used.

In the meantime, my office and I are hard at work helping constituents, so please do not hesitate to contact me if there is anything I can do to be of assistance. I can be reached via gavin.williamson.mp@parliament.uk or by calling my office on 01785 847027.