Barges and military bases more expensive than hotels for asylum seekers: 'Another bad policy'

The UK government’s use of barges and military bases to house asylum seekers, introduced to reduce the costs of hotels, is costing more than hotels and housing fewer people than expected.

Asylum seekers are being housed in a former RAF base at Wethersfield and the Bibby Stockholm barge. Its initial estimates were that this would be £94m cheaper than hotels. But a new report from the National Audit Office (NAO), published today (20 March), has found they will in fact be £46m more expensive than hotels.

On top of this, the sites are housing fewer asylum seekers than planned. The Home Office had expected the Bibby Stockholm and Wethersfield base to be accommodating a total of 1,875 people by the end of January 2024. Instead they were accommodating just 897, a shortfall of more than 50%.

“This is another alarming example of bad policies being implemented badly at huge financial and human cost. Instead of considering better value and more appropriate alternatives, the government is intent on housing people seeking asylum in unsuitable accommodation costing over a billion pounds of taxpayers’ money to deliver,” said Enver Solomon, CEO of the Refugee Council.

“The reality is that there would be no need to spend exorbitant sums of money on housing people in barges, military bases or hotels if cases were dealt with in a timely manner.“ 

Concerns have also been raised over the safety of asylum seekers living in the “alternative accommodation”.

A former resident of the Bibby Stockholm told the Big Issue how internet on the barge was turned off in the wake of the suspected suicide of fellow migrant Leonard Farruku. In an interview, he detailed freezing conditions onboard, with limited access to medical care.

At Wethersfield, asylum seekers were reported to have set themselves on fire over poor conditions.

Future “large sites” plans include former student accommodation in Huddersfield.

“The Home Office has made progress in reducing the use of hotels for asylum accommodation. Yet the pace at which the government pursued its plans led to increased risks, and it now expects large sites to cost more than using hotel accommodation,” Gareth Davies, the head of the NAO, said.  

“The Home Office continued this programme despite repeated external and internal assessments that it could not be delivered as planned. Its plan to reset the large sites programme makes sense, and the Home Office should reflect on lessons learned from establishing its large sites programme at speed and improve coordination with central and local government given wider housing pressures.” 

The Home Office has been raiding the foreign aid budget to pay for asylum accommodation, with around 80% of the £2.3bn spent on hotels in 2022 coming from the overseas aid budget. It has warned that the bill for accommodation could hit £11bn.