Question to the Home Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Murray of Blidworth on 21 February (HL5629), whether they now plan to make an assessment of organised criminal gangs targeting unaccompanied children seeking asylum and being accommodated in hotels, given the statement by Greater Manchester Police that they have intelligence confirming the hotel networks used to house asylum seekers are targeted by organised criminal gangs, and that children are put to work selling drugs within weeks of arriving in the UK.

The safety and wellbeing of those in our care is our primary concern. We have robust safeguarding procedures in place to ensure all unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) in emergency interim hotels are safe and supported whilst we seek urgent placements with a local authority. Young people are supported by team leaders and support workers who are on site 24 hours a day. Further care is provided in hotels by teams of specialist social workers and nurses

We have no power to detain UASC in hotels and we know some do go missing. Many of those who have gone missing are subsequently traced and located. Children’s movements in and out of hotels are monitored and recorded and they are accompanied by support workers when attending organised activities and social excursions off-site, or where specific vulnerabilities are identified

When any young person goes missing the ‘missing persons protocol’ is followed and led by our directly engaged social workers. A multi-agency, missing persons protocol is mobilised involving the police and the local authority, who have a shared statutory responsibility to safeguard all children, including missing migrant children, in order to establish their whereabouts and to ensure that they are safe.