Suella Braverman faces criticism as migrant crisis worsens

Conditions at Manston have been described as "wholly unacceptable" by the local MP

Suella Braverman has said the UK's asylum system is "broken" in response to criticisms of the migrant crisis.

The home secretary defended the government's stance on illegal migration in the Commons on Monday.

She rejected accusations from a senior Tory MP that she had allowed Manston, a migrant holding centre in Kent, to get dangerously overcrowded.

She insisted that she "never ignored legal advice" on using hotels to house migrants.

Ms Braverman has been accused of failing to sign off on measures which could have eased pressure at Manston, following reports of over 4,000 migrants being housed there, despite it being meant to hold just 1,600 when it was built.

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Facing questions in the Commons from Labour and Tory MPs, she said the government was "determined to address the wholly unacceptable situation which has left taxpayers with a bill of £6.8 million a day for hotel accommodation."

She told MPs it was "practically impossible" to find more than 1,000 beds at short notice as she defended the decision to keep thousands of people at the Manston site.

"What I have refused to do is to prematurely release thousands of people into local communities without having anywhere for them to stay."

She promised to visit the Kent site "shortly" and in response to questions over her decision-making, said: "I have never ignored legal advice, as a former attorney general I know the importance of taking legal advice into account."

She added: "On no occasion have I blocked the procurement of hotels or alternative accommodation to ease the pressure on Manston, I'm afraid that simply isn't true."

The government has said in the year ending June 2022, there were 63,089 asylum applications - 77% more than in 2019.

Migrants are supposed to be kept at the Manston centre for 24 hours only - when the chief inspector of immigration visited last week, however, he found some people had been there for over a month. That included one family who had been detained for 32 days, sleeping on mats in a marquee.

Nearly 1,000 migrants crossed the English Channel in boats on Saturday and a further 468 made the crossing on Sunday, according to the government.

So far this year 39,898 people have made the journey from France on small boats, making this a pressing issue for the government to tackle.

Ms Braverman told MPs: "We need to be straight with the public. The system is broken. Illegal migration is out of control and too many people are interested in playing political parlour games, covering up the truth than solving the problem."

Ms Braverman was warned that the government was breaching statutory duties by failing to sign off on ways to move people to hotels or alternative accommodation, the BBC has been told.

One source said there was "crystal clear" advice that the government was not acting within the law.

Ms Braverman was home secretary to Liz Truss for 43 days before she resigned after admitting breaking ministerial rules.

She was reappointed last week by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who said she had accepted she made a mistake.

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Sources have said former home secretary Priti Patel had also been "reluctant" to sign off on sending asylum seekers to hotels, but she did so because she was aware it was her statutory duty to do so.

Grant Shapps is also said to have taken action to ease congestion during his brief period as in the same government post.

The Home Office said: "Claims advice were deliberately ignored are completely baseless."

Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper questioned how the public could have confidence in Ms Braverman when she reportedly ignored legal advice on her duty to house migrants and broke ministerial rules on handling official documents.

The home secretary responded: "I've been clear, I made an error of judgment. I apologised for that error. I took responsibility for it and I resigned."

Senior Tory MP Sir Roger Gale earlier said the situation at the processing centre was "wholly unacceptable" and suggested it may have "developed deliberately".

He said: "I was told that the home office was finding it very difficult to secure hotel accommodation. I now understand this was a policy issue and that a decision was taken not to book additional hotel space.

"There are simply far too many people and this situation should never have been allowed to develop, and I'm not sure that it hasn't almost been developed deliberately."

Sir Roger, MP for the Kent constituency of North Thanet since May 2010, said he believed it was a decision taken by a home secretary, but he was not sure if it was Ms Braverman or her predecessor Ms Patel.

The situation at Manston is still understood to be critical with thousands of asylum seekers, housed in temporary tents hastily erected in the grounds of the former military air base.

Over the weekend, activists recorded children at the centre shouting "freedom, freedom" and "we need your help".

Following a visit by Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick on Sunday there has been significant effort to secure accommodation for up to 4,000 migrants at Manston, some of whom have been there for more than a month.

Four coaches have been seen going into the base on Monday, but one left early this afternoon with just a handful of asylum seekers aboard.

The intention was that the facility would process migrants in a matter of hours before they were moved on to accommodation elsewhere.

But such is the asylum backlog that 96% of those who arrived by small boats last year have still not had an initial assessment of their claim with more than 127,000 stuck in the system.

Some local residents have spoken to the BBC about the situation.

Sue Doyle shared her shock at finding an Albanian boy, aged just 16, in her living room, after two boats pulled up onto a beach near Dover Harbour eight days ago.

The occupants disappeared into nearby woodland, and a short time later the teenager ended up in her house - until police eventually arrived.

Ms Doyle told she was not happy to hear that local residents had been advised to keep their windows and doors shut to prevent a similar incident happening again.

She said: "So next summer we've got to live in a prison - we've got to keep all our windows and doors locked, which I don't think we should have to."

In a separate development, three people were arrested on Sunday after the National Crime Agency (NCA) and the Belgian Federal Police targeted a suspected organised crime group involved in smuggling migrants into the UK.

Two men, from Basingstoke and aged 34 and 44, were arrested on suspicion of people-smuggling offences as they arrived on the coast near Nieuwpoort.

A third man, 46, was arrested on suspicion of assisting unlawful immigration on the same day by the NCA in Aylesbury.

Twelve migrants - thought to be Albanian nationals - were also detained.

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