Britain Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick revealed on Wednesday that the UK intends to temporarily lodge asylum seekers in abandoned military bases and may utilise ships and barges in the future in an effort to cut lodging costs.
Britain temporary asylum seekers
He informed lawmakers that the government intended to convert barracks buildings and movable buildings at two former Royal Air Force sites in southeast and eastern England to host “several thousand” asylum seekers.
Also, a different location on private property in East Sussex, in southeast England, would be used, said Jenrick.
In an effort to save its $2.8 billion yearly hotel cost, the government is also looking at the “possibility of hosting migrants aboard vessels” such as ferries and barges.
The prospect of hotel lodging, according to Jenrick, is a temptation for individuals risking their lives to cross the Channel illegally. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made curbing such crossings one of his major goals.
“These hotels take valuable assets from communities and place pressures on local public services,” he told MPs, adding “we must not elevate the wellbeing of illegal migrants above those of the British people”.
“Accommodation for migrants should meet their essential living needs and nothing more, because we cannot risk becoming a magnet for the millions of people who are displaced and seeking better economic prospects,” the minister said.
However charities and the Labour Party, whose shadow interior minister Yvette Cooper termed the accommodations “grossly insufficient,” oppose the plans, calling them a “admittance of failure.”
Additionally, it appears that the government may face legal challenges from local councils controlled by their own Conservative party on the use of the airfields.
As part of an agreement with France to stop illegal immigration across the English Channel, the Britain announced on Friday that it will pay $576 million over the following three years.
The agreement was disclosed on Friday in Paris during a joint summit between French President Emmanuel Macron and Britain Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
Joint Statement by Both Nations on Illegal Immigration
According to a joint statement from the two nations, the funds would be used to build a new detention facility for migrants in France and to dispatch 500 security and support personnel “to enable the fastest detection of attempted crossings” by small boats.
Following years of tense discussions over immigration, fishing rights, a submarine agreement with Australia, and post-Brexit negotiations, the two presidents emphasized the close ties between their nations on Friday.
“The level of ambition of this plan is exactly what we need,” Macron said, adding, “this is not an agreement between UK and France but between UK and EU.”
Human rights organizations have condemned Sunak for his efforts to halt cross-Channel immigration with a new rule that the UK has described as discriminatory, illegal, and impractical.
The number of illegal immigrants who pay human trafficking organizations to get them into the UK in small, unseaworthy vessels has increased. Several of these boats have sunk, resulting in fatalities.
The joint statement from the Elysee Palace, which was 19 pages long, concentrated on the potential for increased defence cooperation between the two nuclear powers, including everything from the stationing of fighter jets on one another’s aircraft carriers to the joint development of cruise missiles in the future.
The presidents pledged better coordination with regard to Ukraine, particularly with regard to the delivery of supplies and weapons to Kyiv.
They also pledged support for the training of Ukrainian marines in the UK, while offering to pursue “security guarantees” with Ukraine “that will help [Kyiv] to defend itself long-term and to block potential future attacks,” the joint statement said.
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