Surrey council now seeking legal advice over asylum hotel plans
A Surrey council is now seeking legal advice as it urges the Home Office to reconsider asylum hotel changes.
The scheme, which was temporarily paused on August 1, planned for the asylum seeking families in the Stanwell Hotel to be relocated and replaced by only male refugees.
Frustrated Stanwell residents have been protesting outside the hotel almost every night over the last week.
Spelthorne Borough Council leader Joanne Sexton said she was seeking legal advice about the Home Office proposals at an extraordinary council meeting on August 7.
Councillors voted on Thursday to ask the Home Office to “immediately reconsider its plans to utilise the Stanwell Hotel to house adult male only asylum seekers”.
Furious residents gathered outside the Knowle Green council offices in Staines in protest of the Home Office’s plans.
“They’re unchecked young males that should not be put up in a hotel,” said Brenda John, 58, protesting outside the council.
“It’s a small community in a small village. We have schools, parks and youth clubs on the doorstep.”
Julia, 56, also demonstrating said: “It’s the cost of the taxpayer’s money going into it which is out of order. We’ve all put into this system but they haven’t but they’re getting more.”
Cllr Jon Button told the meeting how families already housed at the hotel had successfully integrated with the community, local schools and food banks.
Conservative councillors called for the “immediate and permanent closure of the hotel used as an asylum seeker facility and urge the Home Office to return the hotel back to the local community”. But the motion was defeated.
“The policy is a disgrace, unfair, unsafe and unsustainable,” said Cllr Karen Howkins. “People are scared for their wives, children and elderly neighbours.” Cllr Sinead Mooney said Stanwell residents want the hotel returned back to the community rather than exclusively for asylum seekers.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The government is reducing expensive hotel use as part of a complete overhaul of the asylum system.
“From over 400 asylum hotels open in summer 2023, costing almost £9m a day, there are now less than 210, and we want them all closed by the end of this Parliament.
“We will continue to work closely with community partners across the country, and discuss any concerns they have, as we look to fix this broken system together. The security of the local communities within which hotels are located will always be our paramount concern.”