Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has plans to cease using the Copthorne Hotel in East Grinstead and Uckfield constituency to accommodate asylum seekers by the end of 2026.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister of State (Home Office)
Exiting all asylum hotels as soon as possible is one of the Government’s top priorities and must be executed through a controlled, managed and orderly plan of work. This plan involves reducing inflow, speeding up caseworking, maximising utilisation of our estate, continuing to increase returns and exploring the use of large sites as suitable alternative accommodation.
Hotel closures will be prioritised based on a wide range of criteria which include but are not limited to cohort-based planning, operational desirability, costs, utilisation, geographical factors and mitigating provider-related risks. The hotel exit programme will be carefully managed to ensure that all supported asylum seekers are provided with suitable alternative accommodation, including large sites, elsewhere in the estate.
For safety, security, and operational reasons, the department does not comment on individual hotels or the timing of closures. Instead, scheduled closures are carefully managed and communicated directly to local authority Chief Executives and MPs when decisions are made.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the Copthorne Hotel in East Grinstead and Uckfield constituency will be included in the next round of asylum hotel closures.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister of State (Home Office)
Exiting all asylum hotels as soon as possible is one of the Government’s top priorities and must be executed through a controlled, managed and orderly plan of work. This plan involves reducing inflow, speeding up caseworking, maximising utilisation of our estate, continuing to increase returns and exploring the use of large sites as suitable alternative accommodation.
Hotel closures will be prioritised based on a wide range of criteria which include but are not limited to cohort-based planning, operational desirability, costs, utilisation, geographical factors and mitigating provider-related risks. The hotel exit programme will be carefully managed to ensure that all supported asylum seekers are provided with suitable alternative accommodation, including large sites, elsewhere in the estate.
For safety, security, and operational reasons, the department does not comment on individual hotels or the timing of closures. Instead, scheduled closures are carefully managed and communicated directly to local authority Chief Executives and MPs when decisions are made.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria her Department uses to determine which hotels accommodating asylum seekers will be closed and (ii) the order in which those hotels will be closed.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister of State (Home Office)
Exiting all asylum hotels as soon as possible is one of the Government’s top priorities and must be executed through a controlled, managed and orderly plan of work. This plan involves reducing inflow, speeding up caseworking, maximising utilisation of our estate, continuing to increase returns and exploring the use of large sites as suitable alternative accommodation.
Hotel closures will be prioritised based on a wide range of criteria which include but are not limited to cohort-based planning, operational desirability, costs, utilisation, geographical factors and mitigating provider-related risks. The hotel exit programme will be carefully managed to ensure that all supported asylum seekers are provided with suitable alternative accommodation, including large sites, elsewhere in the estate.
For safety, security, and operational reasons, the department does not comment on individual hotels or the timing of closures. Instead, scheduled closures are carefully managed and communicated directly to local authority Chief Executives and MPs when decisions are made.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many asylum seekers are currently accommodated at the Copthorne Hotel in East Grinstead and Uckfield constituency.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister of State (Home Office)
For the safety and security of those we accommodate, staff and local communities, it is our longstanding policy not to disclose information about sites which may or may not be utilised by the Home Office.
Data on the number of asylum seekers receiving support and accommodation, which can also be split into each Local Authority area, is published quarterly in the Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK.
The latest published figures show that, as of 30 June 2026, the following numbers of individuals were receiving asylum support in Mid Sussex:
- 321 people in contingency hotel accommodation
- 4 people in dispersal accommodation
- 1 person receiving subsistence only support
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average monthly cost was of accommodating asylum seekers at the Copthorne Hotel in East Grinstead and Uckfield constituency in the last 12 months.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister of State (Home Office)
For the safety and security of those we accommodate, staff and local communities, it is our longstanding policy not to disclose information about sites which may or may not be utilised by the Home Office.
We do not report and hold data at this granularity and would only be obtainable at disproportionate cost. The Home Office publishes information on asylum expenditure in the Home Office Annual Report and Accounts 2025 to 2026 – GOV.UK (opens in a new tab).
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many MP surgeries have Ministers in her Department had with MPs (a) in the period July 2024 to January 2025 and (b) since January 2025.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
Minister Jess Philips:
a.) 1, b.) 5
Minister Dame Diana Johnson:
a.) 1, b.) 2
Minister Seema Malhotra:
a.) 1, b.) 3
Minister Mike Tapp:
a.) n/a, b.) 8
Minister Dan Jarvis:
a.) 0, b.) 1
Minister Dame Angela Eagle:
a.) 2, b.) 4
Minister Natalie Fleet:
a.) n/a, b.) 0
Minister Alex Norris:
a.) n/a, b.) 17
Minister Sarah Jones:
None, instead regular engagement in a variety of ways.
Minister Lord David Hanson:
None, as he is not an MP.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate her Department has made of the number of police officers in September (a) 2024 and (b) 2025 in East Grinstead and Uckfield Constituency.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office collects and publishes data on the size of the police workforce in England and Wales, broken down by Police Force Area (PFA), on a bi-annual basis in the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-workforce-england-and-wales.
This data is collected by PFA level only, and information at lower levels of geography, such as parliamentary constituencies are not collected. Data on the number of police officers in Sussex, as at 30 September 2024 and 2025 on a full-time equivalent and headcount basis, can be found in Table 1 of the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales: as at 30 September 2025’ release here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-workforce-england-and-wales-30-september-2025.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of the number of asylum seekers on trends in levels of recorded crime in Sussex.
Answered by Alex Norris - Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice
The Government takes any allegation of criminality involving asylum seekers extremely seriously. Allegations of criminal activity are matters for the police, who are responsible for recording, investigating, and progressing criminal reports, and no one in the UK, including asylum seekers, is above the law.
The Home Office is working closely with policing partners, local authorities, and accommodation providers to strengthen how risk linked to criminality and serious harm are identified, understood and managed, both within the asylum accommodation estate and in local communities. We are reviewing information available to improve our understanding of these issues and to support effective operational responses.
Through enhanced public protection arrangements, intelligence sharing and close operational collaboration, the Home Office is taking proactive action to identity and manage individuals who may pose a risk, supporting both community safety and confidence in the asylum system. Where incidents occur, established processes ensure appropriate action is taken to tackle crime and anti-social behaviour and additional support is deployed where necessary.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment her Department has made of trends in the level of shoplifting in East Grinstead and Uckfield constituency.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
We delivered more than 3,000 additional police officers and PCSOs into neighbourhood roles since March 2025.There are signs the tide is turning, with a small fall in shop theft offences by 1% in the year ending December 2025 compared with the previous year. This is compared with increases of nearly 30% in the period before the election.
We are removing the £200 threshold for shop theft and commencing the new offence of assaulting a retail worker as soon as possible.
We are also equipping the police to fight the organised crime gangs that drive shop theft across the country. Our £5m investment in the specialist OPAL policing unit is boosting intelligence-led policing to identify offenders, disrupt the tactics used to target shops, and bring more criminals to justice.
The Home Office collects and publishes information on the number of Shoplifting offences recorded by the police in England and Wales. This information is published at Force and Community Safety Partnership level for Sussex police.
The latest information, for the year ending December 2025, is available here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/police-recorded-crime-and-outcomes-open-data-ta…
Data by constituency level is not published.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment her Department has made of trends in the level of shoplifting in East Sussex.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
We delivered more than 3,000 additional police officers and PCSOs into neighbourhood roles since March 2025.There are signs the tide is turning, with a small fall in shop theft offences by 1% in the year ending December 2025 compared with the previous year. This is compared with increases of nearly 30% in the period before the election.
We are removing the £200 threshold for shop theft and commencing the new offence of assaulting a retail worker as soon as possible.
We are also equipping the police to fight the organised crime gangs that drive shop theft across the country. Our £5m investment in the specialist OPAL policing unit is boosting intelligence-led policing to identify offenders, disrupt the tactics used to target shops, and bring more criminals to justice.
The Home Office collects and publishes information on the number of Shoplifting offences recorded by the police in England and Wales. This information is published at Force and Community Safety Partnership level for Sussex police.
The latest information, for the year ending December 2025, is available here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/police-recorded-crime-and-outcomes-open-data-ta…
Data by constituency level is not published.