Home Office to close 150 asylum seeker hotels

The Home Office has announced that by May around 150 migrant hotels will close, which comes after figures have revealed £4.3 billion of the overseas aid budget has been spent on hosting refugees.

Compared to six months ago there is now 20,000 fewer people staying in the accommodation, this is down from 56,000 asylum seekers at the end of September.

In 2023 tens of thousands of asylum seekers were placed in hotels and the Home Office was spending £8 million every day.

Last October the former Immigration Minister announced the government will be “exiting” some 50 hotels by the start of the 2024.

On Wednesday the Home Secretary James Cleverly said, “We promised to end the use of asylum hotels and house asylum seekers at more appropriate, cheaper accommodation; we are doing that at a rapid pace.

“These closures deliver on the Government’s plan to cut the use of hotels in the asylum system, and we will keep going until the last hotel is closed.”

The Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) said, “Far from reducing as the costs of schemes for Ukrainian and Afghan refugees fell, the amount of aid spent within the UK was driven up further by the Home Office’s spending on hotel accommodation for asylum seekers.”