Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government, in the light of the National Audit Office’s report Investigation into asylum accommodation, published on 20 March, which found that (1) using large sites to accommodate asylum seekers could cost £46 million more than using hotels, and (2) the Home Office rated their own plans as “high risk or undeliverable”, why the large sites accommodation programme will be continued.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government has always been clear that the use of asylum hotels is unacceptable, and that’s why we acted swiftly to reduce the impact on local communities by moving asylum seekers on to barges and former military sites.
Thanks to the actions the Government has taken to maximise the use of existing space and our work to cut small boat crossings by a third last year, the cost of hotels will fall, and we are now closing dozens of asylum hotels every month to return them to communities.
Large sites provide adequate and functional accommodation for asylum seekers and are designed to be as self-sufficient as possible, helping to minimise the impact on local communities and services. They reduce demand on an already pressured private rental market and their larger capacity allows the Home Office to be agile in responding to fluctuations in demand.
It is better value for money for the taxpayer to continue with these sites than to continue using hotels. The latest assessment of value for money, which excludes committed or spent costs in line with the Green Book methodology, shows that large sites would be £153 million cheaper than hotels.
Despite the need to stand up large sites at speed, controls were in place to assure value for money for the taxpayer. Operational challenges at the sites have changed our costs since original estimates. We continue to keep costs under review while developing ways to reduce it.
The latest Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) review has upgraded the rating of the programme, meaning that the successful delivery of time, quality and cost is feasible.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many unaccompanied asylum-seeking children have been received into Home Office accommodation each year since 2021 in (1) Leicester, and (2) Leicestershire.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The wellbeing of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children is our priority. We maintain that the best place for these children to be accommodated is within local authority care.
There are currently no unaccompanied children in hotels and there has never been unaccompanied asylum seeking hotels in Leicester. Nationally all unaccompanied children’s hotel accommodation has been empty since 18 November 2023. Of the 7 hotels which were operational in 2022, 6 of those were closed permanently on 30 November 2023.
We take the safety of those in our care seriously. We have robust safeguarding procedures in place to ensure all young people in emergency interim hotels were safe and supported as we sought urgent placements with a local authority.
The specific data requested cannot be provided as it comes from live operational databases that have not been quality assured.
The most recent published data can be found at Asylum and resettlement datasets - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many unaccompanied asylum-seeking children have gone missing from Home Office accommodation since 2021 in (1) Leicester, and (2) Leicestershire.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The wellbeing of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children is our priority. We maintain that the best place for these children to be accommodated is within local authority care.
There are currently no unaccompanied children in hotels and there has never been unaccompanied asylum seeking hotels in Leicester. Nationally all unaccompanied children’s hotel accommodation has been empty since 18 November 2023. Of the 7 hotels which were operational in 2022, 6 of those were closed permanently on 30 November 2023.
We take the safety of those in our care seriously. We have robust safeguarding procedures in place to ensure all young people in emergency interim hotels were safe and supported as we sought urgent placements with a local authority.
The specific data requested cannot be provided as it comes from live operational databases that have not been quality assured.
The most recent published data can be found at Asylum and resettlement datasets - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have made a decision about whether the power under the Illegal Migration Act 2023 for the Home Office to accommodate children will come into force; and if so, when.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Illegal Migration Act received Royal Assent on 20 July 2023. The Act seeks to ensure the only way to come to the UK for protection will be through safe and legal routes and will take power out of the hands of the criminal gangs and protect vulnerable people, including children.
Following the High Court ECPAT judgment and Supreme Court judgment on Rwanda, the Government is carefully reflecting on commencement of the powers in the Act, including those relating to the accommodation and transfer of unaccompanied children.
These powers have not yet been commenced and a decision will be made in due course. The Act does not change a local authority’s statutory obligations to children from the date of arrival and that the best place for an unaccompanied child is in the care of a local authority. This is something the Government was consistently clear about during the Illegal Migration Act’s passage through Parliament.
We are working at pace with Kent County Council, other government departments and local authorities across the UK to ensure suitable local authority placements are provided for unaccompanied asylum seeking children urgently and sustainably.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the National Audit Office's report on the Government's Asylum and Protection Transformation Programme.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The NAO report into the Asylum & Protection Transformation Programme fully recognises the significance of the transformation programme, and the efforts of the Home Office to reform the asylum and protection system.
The report acknowledges the key work the programme has done to date to tackle the challenges facing the asylum system, but notes concern around securing dispersal accommodation, and the ability of decision makers to clear the backlog. The report suggested three recommendations for the programme to increase its chances of success, all of which are accepted and embedded within our programme approach going forward.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the cost of using and converting (1) RAF Scampton, (2) MDP Wethersfield, (3) the Northeye site, and (4) the Bibby Stockholm barge for asylum-seeker accommodation; and what assessment they have made of the value of the contracts to the agencies managing these sites.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The United Kingdom has a legal obligation to provide asylum seekers who would otherwise be destitute with accommodation and other support whilst their claim for asylum is being considered.
Ongoing work across government is being undertaken to identify and secure alternative, more appropriate, cost-effective accommodation options around the country. In exploring potential alternative large sites, we continue to consider all available options to source appropriate and cost-effective temporary accommodation.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the costs of implementing the recommendations made in the report by the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration 2021, An inspection of asylum casework (August 2020–May 2021), published on 18 November 2021.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The Home office welcomes the recommendations made in the report by the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration 2021 “An inspection of asylum casework”; and we are taking immediate action to accelerate decision-making and rapidly speed up processing times to eliminate the backlog of people waiting for initial asylum decisions by the end of 2023.
Costs related to implementing the recommendations made in the report have not been assessed independently from the wider costs of the asylum system.
Asylum costs are detailed in the Home Office Annual Report and Accounts, with the most recent Annual Report and Accounts for 2021 to 2022 published on 14 July 2022 and available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/home-office-annual-report-and-accounts-2021-to-2022