Want to bring you more now on one of our
top stories. Councils across England are
considering launching legal action to
block asylum seekers being housed in
hotels. It follows a successful
challenge by Eping Forest District
Council. Joined now by Imran Hussein,
director of external affairs at the
Refugee Council. Good to have you with
us. I appreciate you sharing your time.
What's your reaction to what we're
seeing first of all in Eping and now it
appears as though Brocks Council will
try and follow Eping's lead. What do you
make of all this? Well, I mean the first
thing to say is nobody thinks uh asylum
seekers should be kept in hotels while
their case is being assessed. It's very
expensive. It's not good for the asylum
seekers. It's isolating. It's an
isolating experience even before the
protest with the protest is incredibly
terrifying for for people. Um and of
course, as we've seen uh for local
communities, there's a lot of tension
and some of which is being exploited by
people on the far right. So, no one
thinks it's a good idea. I think we're
looking at this case and obviously the
ca the court case uh kind of hinged on
it on it being a planning issue. This
isn't a planning issue really. This is a
failure of public policy. For 20 odd
years we've supported asylum seekers uh
through uh a system that worked
perfectly well. We had accommodation for
people without using hotels. Um but in
the last few years uh there's been a
huge backlog of cases that's grown up
because the previous government stopped
making decisions on cases because it
wanted to send people to Rwanda. That
backlog has meant that um the
accommodation that was existing was full
and people had the government had to use
hotels. So we have to remember this
isn't a planning issue. This is just a
failure of policy uh to process claims.
I think we're pleased that the new
government has come in and starting uh
to uh get a grip on the the decision-
making. Its commitment is to end the use
of hotels by 2029. We don't think that's
right. I think it it must speed up uh
because um the all the concerns that we
you know we're hearing about the cost
about how refugees themselves feel about
being placed in these places and the
community tensions means that the
government has got to prioritize and
come up with a solution uh pretty
quickly.
>> Eping council had put forward that
planning argument. That's the one you're
saying. It's it's not the high courts
made that temporary ruling, further
deliberations to be had in in the
autumn, but the the council there going
down the the direction of planning and
of health and safety. You argue that's
not the case. What what do you think the
real reason therefore is if if it's not
planning as as is being suggested?
>> So just to be clear, clearly the legal
challenge at the moment is a based is
based on the planning rules and that's
what's that's what's being played out at
the moment. But I I think which
whichever way it goes eventually with
these cases in the end the judgment is
should we be using hotels and I think I
think most people agree we shouldn't. We
have to ask ourselves why we're using
hotels and that's because we stopped
processing claims and the government is
now playing catchup to get a grip on
decision-m and process claims. So yes,
there's a planning issue that's right in
front of us and in front of the courts,
but fundamentally what this is really
about was just a failure to deal uh uh
with decision-m and process cases. So
the answer has to be uh um getting a
grip on uh on decision-m decisions.
There are lots of people near the sign
uh process who are waiting for decisions
who come from countries where it's it's
almost certain that because the nature
of the conflicts they're fleeing that
they will get protection and so those
cases if they're prioritized can make a
huge dent into the backlog which means
that we may not be uh have to use
hotels.
>> I'm just thinking about the hotels you
know you say they're not the best use of
them. They're not the best place to
house people. The government says the
same. The conservatives say the same. I
think political parties of all colors
would would agree with that. But what
are our other options? Just looking for
example at the moment gov.uk social
housing. There's 1.33 million households
on local authority housing registers.
You know the 10-year high for London
social housing. If if hotels aren't
being used, where else can we provide
accommodation for people who, like you
say, many of whom will have legitimate
asylum claims without creating a
different conflict elsewhere with local
communities.
So remember the way the system works is
if someone claims asylum the home office
assesses that claim whilst that claim is
being assessed they can't work. So we've
got a duty uh uh a moral illegal duty to
provide those people with shelter and
food while their claim is being
assessed. At the moment uh about 30% of
people who are being supported are in
hotels. The other accommodation is a mix
of um um uh private rented accommodation
that's been secured uh by local
authorities with the support of central
government uh and uh and and also some
uh spaces in in large
camps. Um so I imagine
if you know we don't know for certain
what's going to happen with these the
impact of these cases and where the
courts will end up and what it what it
means but if there are
>> if there are people that need to be
moved and I imagine it will they will
move to those kind of existing uh places
sources of
>> apologies we have to leave their time is
not our friend but appreciate your time
thank you so