Home Office apologises over asylum seeker plan

The Home Office said it was looking at the plan's community impact

The Home Office has apologised over its handling of plans to house asylum seekers at an East Sussex military site.

Officials recently announced hundreds of people would be temporarily housed at a training camp near Crowborough.

Wealden District Council has criticised the Home Office over an "information vacuum" around the plans, which it said had fuelled community tensions and threats against councillors.

Home Office director of asylum accommodation Andrew Larter said he was sorry for the "difficult impact" on councillors and the community.

'More spartan'

Answering questions from councillors on Monday, he said housing asylum seekers at the training camp would cost roughly the same as accommodating them in hotels.

Costs are expected to exceed £100 per person per night - on top of money needed to make the site suitable for asylum seekers.

Mr Larter told the meeting the camp accommodation would be "more spartan" and "less comfortable" than hotels.

The Home Office has previously said that military sites would deliver better outcomes for taxpayers and reduce the impact on communities.

The Labour government has pledged to stop using hotels - which have become protest flashpoints - before the next election.

One resident previously told the BBC they did not notice refugees and asylum seekers at the site before

Wealden district councillor Christina Coleman told the meeting there was a "great deal of hostility" among some Crowborough residents towards councillors.

She added this reflected not just concern about the plans but also "the way this process has been managed".

Worries have been raised about staffing at the camp, police provision, the additional strain on public services, and public safety.

Other residents have called for compassion and said they "didn't really notice" when people from Afghanistan were housed at the site after being evacuated from the country in 2021.

• Inside an asylum hotel: 'We're too scared to leave'

Mr Larter and the Home Office deputy director of asylum accommodation, David Harding, told the meeting the training camp would be "as self-contained as possible", including health and recreational facilities.

The pair said it was "looking like" around 540 asylum seekers would be accommodated there.

They confirmed the Home Office was still completing a community impact assessment to make sure the site was "safe, legal and compliant".

An NGO has said housing asylum seekers at military sites risked human rights abuses

They said they had not formally confirmed their decision to use the site and did not know when the asylum seekers would start to move in, but that it would not be before the end of November.

The non-governmental organisation Conversation Over Borders, which works with refugees and asylum seekers, previously told the BBC housing people at the military site risked "human rights failures" and could "waste taxpayers' money".

"Everyone seeking safety deserves a place to call home without being isolated or retraumatised," it said.