Town scraps sanctuary plans for asylum seekers

Plans to pursue Council of Sanctuary status had become the focus of intense scrutiny

Plans to make Weston-super-Mare a Council of Sanctuary - a scheme designed to signpost asylum seekers and refugees to services - have been scrapped.

A proposal for the town council to pursue the award was approved in March, but the decision has since faced intense scrutiny against a backdrop of mounting anti-immigration protests over the summer.

More than 100 protesters against the scheme gathered outside the meeting on Monday night, where there were chants of "send them home" in the crowd.

Liberal Democrat councillor Caroline Reynolds, who first proposed joining the scheme, said she was "disappointed" and claimed councillors had been swayed by "misinformation and misunderstanding".

The town council initially passed plans to join the scheme in March

This was disputed by Labour town councillor James Clayton, who said: "We don't need a badge, we don't need a certificate, we are a welcoming town, we've proven that historically and we'll continue to prove that in future."

There are more than 100 councils, including Bath and Bristol, already signed up to the scheme run by charity City of Sanctuary UK.

Councillor Clayton claimed that joining "would be binding ourselves to rules and expectations written elsewhere" but the charity said it does not tell authorities what to do.

The award aims to make it easier for asylum seekers and refugees to navigate settling into the area, and provides the training and support that comes with being part of a network of local authorities already signed up.

Being part of the scheme - which costs £150 to sign up to for three years - does not mean more asylum seekers will come to the area, with the government deciding at a national level where to place people.

'Loud minority'

The campaign against the plan had been picked up by the local branch of Reform UK, who do not have any councillors in the town.

"I'm concerned about the town," said a protester called Matt outside the meeting, "there's a load of unvetted people coming across, we don't want it here. We can be welcoming but we don't want to waste resources on a load of unvetted people."

"People have been led to believe that the council of sanctuary would encourage more people to come to Weston Town Council and that's just not true," Ms Reynolds told BBC Radio Bristol on Tuesday morning.

Despite the disappointment, she added, she was "hopeful" because a "loud minority has woken up the compassionate majority of our beautiful town".

Alison Bancroft, from The Other Place community centre in Weston-super-Mare, told the meeting "the message delivered to our community tonight will have far-reaching effects".

Speaking to the BBC afterwards, she said "It's incredibly hard, seeing what's happening on the streets of Weston… people are feeling less and less and safe. For a group of councillors to say this is a welcoming place, there is a profound lack of awareness of what it actually means to be visually different in this town."

The way the scheme was proposed in March was heavily criticised by Mr Clayton, who said Ms Reynolds had "steamrolled" the process and left councillors with less than a week to consider the ramification of signing up to the Council of Sanctuary award - an accusation Ms Reynolds emphatically denied.

"What I'm against is for an external organisation to dictate to Weston-super-Mare how we should behave or how we should demonstrate our compassion," Mr Clayton said.

"We already know how to look after one another, we already understand what it means to be a good neighbour and just signing up to a scheme is replacing general local goodwill with ticking boxes and bureaucracy," he added.