Find space for 25,000 migrants, officials told
Northop Hall country hotel was chosen to house up to 150 migrants
Home Office officials have been ordered to find accommodation for at least 25,000 migrants from a list of disused Crown properties. They are looking at properties and land of all sizes on an internal government portal that lists available sites.
They range from properties that could accommodate a few dozen asylum seekers to large-scale sites that could house more than 2,000. Officials have been told to look for places that can also accommodate families with young children.
The four sites that have been an-nounced so far, which include a barge in Dorset and former military sites, will house only single, adult, male migrants.
The online portal, which can be accessed only by civil servants and ministers above a certain security clearance, includes a list of about 120 Ministry of Defence sites due for disposal over the coming years.
The list, obtained by The Times, includes properties from across the UK.
One of the largest is St George’s Barracks in the Rutland village of North Luffenham, which is due for closure in 2026 and could provide accommodation for about 2,200 migrants.
It also includes former military accommodation at a site in Feltham, west London, that could provide accommodation for 800 and the disused Forthside Barracks in Stirling, which could house about 350, according to the list.
The Kinnegar Logistics Base, a military site in Co Down, could accommodate 500 migrants.
There are also plans to pay a Hull company called Payman Holdings to build cheap modular units, which are prefabricated buildings constructed off site and then delivered to be installed within a day.
A Home Office source blamed the exercise on the soaring asylum backlog and on ministers for panicking, andsaid: “It feels like a desperate scramble to find any alternative accommodation, as ministers are increasingly frustrated about having to keep using hotels because the backlog in asylum cases remains stubbornly high.”
One of the locations earmarked for a two-storey installation of the modular units to accommodate about 250 migrants is in the small north Wales village of Northop Hall, along with housing for up to 150 more in a country hotel. The proposals would increase the population of the village by a third.
Ministers have set a target of acquiring or leasing enough property from the list to accommodate at least 25,000 migrants, government sources have said. The pressure to find accommodation continues to rise as Channel migrant crossings resumed over the past week owing to warmer weather and calmer conditions at sea. Over the past seven days, 877 migrants have arrived on small boats, taking the total for this year to 4,670.
Last week the Home Office announced four new sites to accommodate up to 5,406. A maximum of 506 migrants will be housed on a barge at Portland Port in Dorset for 18 months; up to 2,000 will be placed at RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire; 1,700 at the MoD site of Wethersfield in Braintree,Essex; and 1,200 will be moved into the site of an old prison at Northeye, near Bexhill-on-Sea in East Sussex, by the end of the year. All four sites face the prospect of legal action from local councils.
Robert Jenrick, the immigration minister, announced that a fifth site, at the Catterick Garrison barracks in Rishi Sunak’s North Yorkshire constituency of Richmond, is also due to be used but the Home Office has yet to confirm when or how many people will be housed there.
Home Office officials have been told to find 25,000 places from the government’s existing estate as part of efforts to move more than 51,000 migrants out of hotels, which is costing the taxpayer more than £6 million per day. Nearly 400 hotels are being used to accommodate asylum seekers.
The Times can also disclose that despite Sunak’s pledge to end the use of hotels to accommodate migrants, a hotel four miles from his constituency home in the town of Northallerton began accommodating asylum seekers last week.
However, the Home Office will face big logistical, legal and financial challenges to leasing and opening the sites.
One source said that the MoD was charging the Home Office “a fortune” for the use of RAF sites.
The Home Office paid a multimillion-pound bill to Serco, the private contractor, after the department was forced to drop plans to house migrants at RAF Linton-on-Ouse last summer.
The MoD withdrew its offer for the Home Office to use the site in August, after a contract with Serco had been signed, government sources said.
The Sun on Sunday reported that only 215 of more than 45,000 migrants who arrived in the UK via small boats have since been deported. A Home Office spokesman said: “The Home Office is committed to making every effort to reduce hotel use and limit the burden on the taxpayer.”
They range from properties that could accommodate a few dozen asylum seekers to large-scale sites that could house more than 2,000. Officials have been told to look for places that can also accommodate families with young children.
The four sites that have been an-nounced so far, which include a barge in Dorset and former military sites, will house only single, adult, male migrants.
The online portal, which can be accessed only by civil servants and ministers above a certain security clearance, includes a list of about 120 Ministry of Defence sites due for disposal over the coming years.
The list, obtained by The Times, includes properties from across the UK.
One of the largest is St George’s Barracks in the Rutland village of North Luffenham, which is due for closure in 2026 and could provide accommodation for about 2,200 migrants.
It also includes former military accommodation at a site in Feltham, west London, that could provide accommodation for 800 and the disused Forthside Barracks in Stirling, which could house about 350, according to the list.
The Kinnegar Logistics Base, a military site in Co Down, could accommodate 500 migrants.
There are also plans to pay a Hull company called Payman Holdings to build cheap modular units, which are prefabricated buildings constructed off site and then delivered to be installed within a day.
A Home Office source blamed the exercise on the soaring asylum backlog and on ministers for panicking, andsaid: “It feels like a desperate scramble to find any alternative accommodation, as ministers are increasingly frustrated about having to keep using hotels because the backlog in asylum cases remains stubbornly high.”
One of the locations earmarked for a two-storey installation of the modular units to accommodate about 250 migrants is in the small north Wales village of Northop Hall, along with housing for up to 150 more in a country hotel. The proposals would increase the population of the village by a third.
Ministers have set a target of acquiring or leasing enough property from the list to accommodate at least 25,000 migrants, government sources have said. The pressure to find accommodation continues to rise as Channel migrant crossings resumed over the past week owing to warmer weather and calmer conditions at sea. Over the past seven days, 877 migrants have arrived on small boats, taking the total for this year to 4,670.
Last week the Home Office announced four new sites to accommodate up to 5,406. A maximum of 506 migrants will be housed on a barge at Portland Port in Dorset for 18 months; up to 2,000 will be placed at RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire; 1,700 at the MoD site of Wethersfield in Braintree,Essex; and 1,200 will be moved into the site of an old prison at Northeye, near Bexhill-on-Sea in East Sussex, by the end of the year. All four sites face the prospect of legal action from local councils.
Robert Jenrick, the immigration minister, announced that a fifth site, at the Catterick Garrison barracks in Rishi Sunak’s North Yorkshire constituency of Richmond, is also due to be used but the Home Office has yet to confirm when or how many people will be housed there.
Home Office officials have been told to find 25,000 places from the government’s existing estate as part of efforts to move more than 51,000 migrants out of hotels, which is costing the taxpayer more than £6 million per day. Nearly 400 hotels are being used to accommodate asylum seekers.
The Times can also disclose that despite Sunak’s pledge to end the use of hotels to accommodate migrants, a hotel four miles from his constituency home in the town of Northallerton began accommodating asylum seekers last week.
However, the Home Office will face big logistical, legal and financial challenges to leasing and opening the sites.
One source said that the MoD was charging the Home Office “a fortune” for the use of RAF sites.
The Home Office paid a multimillion-pound bill to Serco, the private contractor, after the department was forced to drop plans to house migrants at RAF Linton-on-Ouse last summer.
The MoD withdrew its offer for the Home Office to use the site in August, after a contract with Serco had been signed, government sources said.
The Sun on Sunday reported that only 215 of more than 45,000 migrants who arrived in the UK via small boats have since been deported. A Home Office spokesman said: “The Home Office is committed to making every effort to reduce hotel use and limit the burden on the taxpayer.”