UK: High Court ruling on asylum hotel ― 50,000 Channel crossings since 2024 general election ― More deaths of people on the move in Channel and northern France ― First people detained under recent UK-France deal ― NGOs urge political leaders to end div…

• The High Court has ruled that asylum applicants who are being accommodated in a hotel in Essex have to be moved out.
• The number of people who have crossed the Channel in small boats since the change of government in July 2024 has exceeded 50,000.
• One person has died trying to cross the Channel and two others have died in and around camps in northern France in recent weeks.
• The first people to be returned to France as part of the government’s ‘One in, one out’ deal have been detained.
• A large group of NGOs has signed an open letter calling on politicians to use more responsible language when discussing the recent protests outside asylum hotels.

The High Court has ruled that asylum applicants who are being accommodated in a hotel in Essex have to be moved out. On 18 August, the High Court granted a temporary injunction to Epping Forest District Council (EFDC) to the use of the Bell Hotel in Epping as asylum accommodation following a series of anti-migration protests and counter-protests that have taken place there in recent weeks. Commenting on the ruling, Minister of State for Security Dan Jarvis said that the government was “looking at options” for rehousing the residents in “suitably appropriate alternative accommodation” and that it had “never thought that hotels were an appropriate source of accommodation for asylum seekers”. Minister of State for Border Security and Asylum Dame Angela Eagle said that the government would “continue working with local communities to address legitimate concerns” and that “our work continues to close all asylum hotels by the end of this Parliament”. Home Office (Ministry of the Interior) lawyers have stated that the ruling could “substantially impact” the government’s ability to house the 32,000 asylum applicants living in more than 200 hotels if other councils pursue similar legal action and they have warned that the temporary injunction granted to EFDC “runs the risk of acting as impetus for further violent protests”. Commenting on the ruling, the head of ECRE member organisation the Refugee Council, Enver Solomon, said: “Everyone agrees hotels are the wrong answer as they cost the taxpayer billions, trap people in limbo and are flashpoints in communities,” adding: “We see how protests and hostility leave people who have fled war and persecution feeling terrified and targeted in the very places they are forced to live”. “This makes an already traumatising situation worse and prevents people from feeling safe,” he concluded.

The number of people who have crossed the Channel in small boats since the change of government in July 2024 has exceeded 50,000. According to data published by the Home Office on 12 August, 50,271 people have arrived in the UK via this route since the general election that brough the Labour Party to power with its promise to “smash” people-smuggling gangs. Commenting on the situation, Enver Solomon said: “To stop smugglers for good, the government must expand safe and legal routes, such as allowing family members to travel to be with their loved ones who are already in the UK”. “Without these measures, desperate people will continue to take dangerous journeys, and the criminal gangs are likely to simply adapt their approaches,” he added.

Another person has died trying to cross the Channel. According to the Agence France Press news agency, a young Somalian woman drowned as she was attempting to board a boat off a beach close to Dunkirk during the night of 12/13 August. Writing on social media, the NGO Utopia 56 described the woman as the “28th victim of migration policies at this border since the beginning of the year”. In addition to the woman who drowned in the Channel, the body of a man who died by apparent suicide was found in a camp close to Loon-Plage on or before 18 August while the body of a young Sudanese man who is believed to have drowned after falling into a canal whilst trying to wash was discovered near Grande-Synthe the week before. Commenting on the canal incident, Marie Chapell from Utopia 56 said: “This death could have been avoided. It is a symbol of the extreme survival conditions under which these people live. It was not someone swimming”.

The first people to be returned to France as part of the government’s ‘One in, one out’ deal have been detained. According to “a government source” who did not provide a specific number, “more than five nationalities were represented in the dozens held so far”. Speaking to the BBC on 7 August, Home Secretary (Minister of the Interior) Yvette Cooper said that “transfers to immigration removal centres are underway as we speak” and that “anyone who arrives from now on is eligible or immediate detention and return”. She added that the first people could be returned to France “within weeks” and that the government would “robustly defend against any legal challenge that people try”. Commenting on the detentions, the head of the NGO Care4 Calais, Steve Smith, said: “This grubby deal is all about permanently denying people the right to sanctuary. Offering a safe route to one person who has a strong case to be offered protection, while denying somebody else, who may have an equally strong case, is abhorrent”. “It must be challenged and we are keeping all our options open to do so,” he added.

A large group of NGOs has signed an open letter calling on politicians to use more responsible language when discussing the recent protests outside asylum accommodation. On 11 August, 213 organisations, including ECRE member organisations Amnesty International, Safe Passage and the Scottish Refugee Council, signed the letter which described the “pernicious and insidious currents of racism and hatred underlying these protests” as “glaring evidence of a failing system”. The signatories reminded the leaders of UK political parties that “the responsibility to end the divisive politics, racist rhetoric and demonising language of the past is yours” and that “the outpouring of support from communities condemning the hatred is a powerful reminder that these views do not represent the vast majority”.

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