The mother of a man who died in a “hellhole” hotel is demanding an inquiry into an appalling explosion in overdose deaths.
Heartbroken Linda McVean spoke out after her son Frankie – who was not a drug addict – died of an accidental overdose at the notorious Queens Park Hotel in Glasgow on May 14. The tragic 30-year-old was working as a scaffolder and using the hotel as a stop-gap while awaiting a council tenancy, which he had been granted shortly before his death.
Linda, 54, claims he fell prey to rife drug dealing at the premises – where three people died of suspected overdoses in the past month. Linda said: “I am devastated at the death of my beautiful son and I will not allow Frankie to become just another drugs statistic. He was a popular, well loved young man, with so many friends and a loving family and a whole life in front of him.
“If he wasn’t put into that horrific hellhole he would be alive today and I believe the place should be shut down. I have been told by several people who have lived there recently that drug dealing is openly taking place, despite the fact people are dying.
“If you didn’t have a drug habit or an addiction when you checked into the Queens Park Hotel you will be incredibly likely to have one if you ever check out. Or you may well die of an overdose, as so many other people have done.”
Fighting back tears, she added: “My son’s death should be a line in the sand. I want to know what the hotel owners – who are making millions of pounds – are going to do to stop this from happening. And if they are going to do nothing, I want to know how Glasgow City Council can justify sending one more vulnerable person to stay in such a dangerous, terrifying place. There should be a full inquiry into what has been going on in this hotel and the other homeless hotels on the city.”
The Daily Record told last week how five people died in just 19 days at two hotels – the Queens Park in the southside and the Rennie Mackintosh Station Hotel in the city centre. We revealed how two victims had entered the Rennie Mackintosh drug-free, yet died from taking the drugs that were being touted.
The family of tragic Charlene Biggley, 41, told the Record how she had moved from her Kilmarnock home to get away from drugs – but ended up dying of an overdose. And a 52-year-old man who also died at the hotel on May 14 begged a Glasgow City Council homelessness team worker to find an alternative to the Rennie Mackintosh, due to its connection with overdose deaths.
Since March 2020 more than 40 have died of suspected overdoses at just six hotels used by Glasgow City Council to combat homelessness. And at least 23 have died at hotels in the same ownership as the Queens Park Hotel.
The owners of the hotels are believed to have made millions from public funds by running the grim facilities. Linda, from Penilee, Glasgow, said the Queens Park Hotel was run “like a prison” with humiliating constraints, set by Glasgow City Council, on anyone living there.
She said: “Frankie was told that if he had friends in his room he would be chucked out, that if he stayed out after midnight he would be chucked out. He was actually thrown out recently after he spent the night at the home of his Aunt Louise, who he was really close to. Their reasoning was that if he never slept at the hotel then he couldn’t be treated as homeless.
“He was put in another hotel then ended up within weeks getting booked back in at the Queens Park. I just wish that had never happened.”
On the night Frankie died he had been hanging out with other residents he had befriended. Witnesses have told how he took street valium – the biggest killer drug in Scotland in recent years – mixed in makeshift factories by crime gangs.
Linda said: “Frankie was having a bit of a hard time with his mental health. He’d been prescribed anti-depressants and it is so obvious to us all now how vulnerable he was to being offered the street valium. He should never have been put in that deadly situation and I’m distraught to think of his last days in that place. He would take well to people and see the good in them but he was vulnerable to being manipulated by people who would have been dealing drugs.”
Frankie’s brother Jonathan, 35, said all homeless hotels should be manned with a social worker or drugs worker at all times, specifically to prevent overdose deaths. He said: “How many lives will be lost before Glasgow City Council sees that what is happening is a disgrace? If you are housing people in hotels where multiple people are dying, month after month, there has to be a duty of care for them.
“These aren’t just junkies and dossers, they’re people who are down on their luck and badly in need of support. Instead they get a horrible regime that makes them feel like they are in prison. It’s not right.”
Alison Watson, director of Shelter Scotland, has called on the Scottish Government to make good on its pledge to build more social housing for vulnerable people. She said the chronic shortage of social housing across Scotland is why we have such an over-reliance on shoddy temporary accommodation. Until that shortage is addressed people will continue to suffer.”
Adam Hussain, boss of the Queens Park Hotel, told the Daily Record the facility has a zero tolerance policy of drug dealing. He said: “We are hugely sympathetic to the family of Frankie and to anyone who has lost their lives. The issue of trained professional staff is something you should take up with Glasgow City Council.”
Hussain refused to say how much the hotel had been paid by the council to accommodate homeless people. In April, it was revealed by the Museum of Homelessness that at least 157 homeless Scots died last year, taking the total in just three years to 518. A total of 1330 Scots died of overdoses last year – more than four times the rate of the rest of the UK and the worst in Europe by a long way.
A Glasgow City Council spokesperson said: “The council is duty bound to find and provide emergency accommodation for those who present as homeless. This means using a range of establishments in the city. Any death in emergency accommodation is hugely regrettable. Given the lifestyle and complexity of need within the homelessness population there remains a risk of early mortality.
“All homeless people placed in a hotel or B&B receive support from their allocated caseworkers, from across a number of services. Additionally, Homelessness Services have support workers placed within Queens Park Hotel, two to three days a week, with well-being checks on residents carried out daily.”
They added: “Homelessness Services provide pay as you go mobile phones to ensure improved communication with residents and staff liaise directly with accommodation operators on a routine basis. All hotel staff, including security, have received harm reduction advice, Naloxone training and mental health first aid training.
“Our Homelessness Services recently completed a major safeguarding exercise on all hotel and B&B residents ensuring face-to-face engagement and an update on both their move-on plans and treatment and care.”
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