Conservative MPs have expressed frustration at the government’s failure to ease pressure on the UK’s asylum system, as a Home Office minister pledged to stop placing people in hotels.
Robert Jenrick, the immigration minister, said he wanted to house asylum seekers who had arrived in the UK on small boats in “some larger sites to provide decent but basic accommodation”, without naming specific sites.
His comments came as more than a dozen Tories questioned the use of hotels in their constituencies as the Home Office seeks to distribute recent arrivals across the country.
On Monday, Rishi Sunak held talks with EU leaders about curbing the use of small boats in the Channel. Some MPs urged him to “send back” people coming by boat from France, while others urged him to break international laws so people arriving could be immediately deported without going through the asylum system.
The Conservative former minister Maggie Throup said 400 asylum seekers were housed in two hotels in her constituency of Erewash, Derbyshire, a location that was “wholly unsuitable” due to there being “no basic amenities nearby” or extra resources for local services.
Asked to provide a timetable for their closure, Jenrick replied that hotels were not a long-term answer.
“We may need to take some larger sites to provide decent but basic accommodation and, of course, we will need to get through the backlog so that we can get more people out of the system – either by returning them to their home country or granting them asylum,” he said.
Lee Anderson, the Conservative MP for Ashfield, blamed parliament’s inaction for problems in the system. “When are we going to stop blaming the French, the ECHR [European convention on human rights], the lefty lawyers?” he asked.
“The blame lies in this place right now. When are we going to go back and do the right thing and send them straight back the same day?”
Marco Longhi, the MP for Dudley North, urged ministers to ignore EU laws to eject foreign criminals swiftly. “Why, minister, don’t we protect our borders and our people?” he asked.
Scott Benton, the Conservative MP for Blackpool South, asked: “How does he think my constituents who can’t get an NHS dentist or a GP appointment or a council house feel about the fact that we’re spending £2bn a year on hotel bills because we can’t be bothered to solve this issue?”
Jenrick came to the Commons to reply to an urgent question about the illegal overcrowding and mistreatment of asylum seekers at Manston processing centre in Kent.
He said it had now returned to below its maximum 1,600 capacity for the first time in weeks. Last week, the Guardian disclosed that some asylum seekers from Manston had been abandoned in central London.
Labour MPs urged the government to publish details of how many incidents of violence or sexual assault against children had occurred in hotels used to house asylum seekers after disclosures last week. Stella Creasy, the MP for Walthamstow, said “more cases have come to light” of children allegedly being sexually assaulted in hotels for migrants.
Jenrick replied “We have put in place a wide range of support mechanisms”, but did not pledge to publish details.
Several local authorities have started legal challenges against the Home Office for moving asylum seekers to hotels in their areas without notifying them first. Jenrick confirmed that from now on MPs and local authorities would receive prior notification from the Home Office before asylum seekers were moved into their area.
Earlier, the former home secretary Grant Shapps had stopped short of saying that Suella Braverman had followed legal advice in the treatment of people held at Manston.
Shapps, now business secretary, told Sky News that he had followed legal advice and ordered migrants to be moved on from Manston.
Asked if Braverman had ignored the same legal advice, he said: “It’s hard for me to comment but I do know the advice was very clear to me. I acted on that advice.”
Sunak has faced criticism over his decision to reappoint Braverman as home secretary six days after she was sacked over breaching security guidelines.
