Tories to shut 50 asylum hotels - but won't say where amid cynical rumours
The Tory immigration chief has vowed to empty 50 hotels used by asylum seekers - but refused to say where they are.
Robert Jenrick was tight-lipped when challenged over rumours the Tories would target marginal seats in a desperate election strategy. It came after he told the Commons that one in eight of the estimated 400 venues being used to house a massive backlog will be fully available for holidaymakers again by January.
He was accused of showing a "brass neck" and a "lack of ambition" by Labour Shadow Immigration Minister Stephen Kinnock. He asked the minister: "Is it really true that the hotels he's considering will be in marginal constituencies? Does he think the public won't see through that ruse?"
The Home Office later said it would not be revealing where the 50 hotels are. Years of failure to process asylum applications has saddled taxpayers with a hotel bill of £8million a day, which the Government has repeatedly vowed to reduce. The asylum backlog stood at over 175,000 at the end of June, Home Office figures showed.
Mr Kinnock accused the Tories of showing an "utter lack of ambition", telling MPs: "It beggars belief that the minister has the brass neck to come here to do an announcement, not that the Government has cut the number of hotels in use, but that it simply plans to, and by a paltry 12%. Is that it? Is that really the ambition, that there will still be 350 in use at the end of the winter?"
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He went on: "At the moment he sounds like an arsonist who's burned our house down and is expecting us to thank him for throwing a bucket of water at it." Mr Jenrick bragged that the number of small boat crossings had fallen compared to the previous year - although Home Office figures showed 385 people had arrived on seven boats the previous day.
The Tory minister said: "I can inform the House that today the Home Office wrote to local authorities and MPs to inform them that we will now be exiting the first asylum hotels. Hotels in all four nations of the UK. The first 50 of these exits will begin in the coming days and will be complete by the end of January with more tranches to follow shortly but we will not stop there."
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Mr Jenrick said: "We will continue to deliver on our strategy to stop the boats and we will be able to exit more hotels. And as we exit these hotels, we are putting in place dedicated resource to facilitate the orderly and effective management of this process and limit the impact on local communities."
Tory MP Natalie Elphicke, who represents Dover, said the Government had made "immense efforts" to address the issue, adding: "The first sustained reduction in the small boats crossing - and that is welcome. It shows it can be done and that this Conservative Government is doing what it said it would do." Mr Jenrick responded: "Although today marks significant progress, and certainly very significant progress compared to what we are seeing in other European countries, this quite clearly is not enough.
"Her constituents want us to stop the boats in their entirety, and that is what we are setting out to do. So today is not a day for triumphalism, it's a milestone. Tomorrow we get back to work and we get back to stopping the boats."
Conservative former minister Sir Conor Burns said there are "multiple hotels" housing migrants in his Bournemouth West constituency, saying he welcomed the announcement that one would be "taken back", but added: "When can we have the rest of our hotels back?"
Mr Jenrick said: "As we make more progress in stopping the boats, we will make more progress in closing the hotels."
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