Government spending £4.7m a day housing asylum seekers in hotels

The Government is spending £4.7 million a day housing asylum seekers in hotels – almost four times the figure it previously told MPs, the Home Office has said.

On Wednesday the Home Affairs Committee heard the total was £1.2 million, but a Government clarification on Thursday made clear this figure relates to Afghan refugees.

An additional £3.5 million a day is being spent, the Government said, in accommodating asylum seekers from elsewhere.

It is understood the incorrect total, provided to the committee by a Home Office official, arose from a drafting error.

There are 25,000 asylum seekers and 12,000 Afghan refugees in hotels, making a total of 37,000, the Home Office also clarified.

Based on the figures provided, this works out at an estimated £127 per person in a hotel every day on average.

At this level, it could cost £1.7 billion a year, although totals are likely to fluctuate throughout that time period.

A spokesman said: “The use of hotels is unacceptable. It is a short-term solution to the global migration crisis and we are working hard to find appropriate dispersed accommodation for migrants, asylum seekers and Afghan refugees as soon as possible.

“We would urge local authorities to do all they can to help house people permanently.

“Our New Plan for Immigration, which is going through Parliament now, will fix the broken asylum system, enabling us to remove those with no right to be here more quickly.”

At Wednesday’s committee session, MPs were told that the Government is “optimistic” it will find a new way of working with councils “on how we manage these costs”.

Home Secretary Priti Patel said the policy is “thoroughly inadequate”, adding: “We do not want people in hotels.”

She also said the Government and local authorities are “absolutely struggling” to move Afghan refugees into more suitable, permanent accommodation as the country does not have sufficient infrastructure.

Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: “The use of hotels is not only thoroughly inadequate as the Home Secretary told MPs yesterday, it is also causing real harm to men, women and children who have come to our shores in search of safety.

“They have had to struggle to get the basic essentials they need such as clothing and medicines having been left for months on end without sufficient support causing them huge anxiety and distress.

“It’s an incredibly costly and failed strategy that could be easily fixed by using public money more effectively to house people in our communities and allow the right to work.”