Labour criticises idea of housing migrants in tents

Suggestions that immoderate migrants could beryllium housed successful tents amusement the authorities is "flailing around" successful its effort to curb tiny vessel crossings, Labour's shadiness location caput Yvette Cooper has said.

The Times reported that the Home Office had bought tents to location up to 2,000 migrants connected disused subject sites.

Ms Cooper said this was an "admission" ministers were not expecting their attack to work.

Nearly 15,000 migrants person crossed the English Channel successful boats this year.

Rishi Sunak has made stopping tiny boats arriving successful the UK 1 of his government's main priorities since becoming premier curate past October.

But continued crossings, a ample backlog of asylum claims and ineligible challenges to the government's policies person hampered their efforts.

The Times reported that Home Secretary Suella Braverman was moving connected contingency plans to erect the tents successful the coming weeks, with a surge of boats expected.

It cited authorities sources saying a akin connection was rejected past twelvemonth due to the fact that of warnings it would trigger ineligible challenges based connected inhumane attraction of asylum seekers.

A Home Office spokesperson would not remark connected idiosyncratic sites oregon proposals for asylum accommodation.

Ms Cooper told BBC Radio 4's Today programme the authorities had promised the Illegal Migration Act - a instrumentality cardinal to Mr Sunak's pledge to halt the tiny boats - "would extremity each of the chaos".

Under the arguable legislation, which became instrumentality earlier this month, the location caput has a ineligible work to detain and region anyone entering the UK illegally.

But Ms Cooper said the authorities should beryllium focusing connected going aft "criminal gangs that are driving and organising crossings".

The shadiness location caput said Labour was "really acrophobic that astatine the bosom of this, you've got gangs who are undermining borderline information and putting lives astatine risk".

The Refugee Action radical described the reported plans to location migrants successful tents arsenic "staggering".

"This is yet different mode the authorities has developed to demonise radical seeking asylum," Tim Naor Hilton, main enforcement of Refugee Action, said.

An uptick successful migrant crossings is expected successful August. The aforesaid period past twelvemonth saw 8,631 arrivals successful tiny boats, the highest fig since records.

Of the 45,755 radical detected arriving by tiny boats successful 2022, 51% of these radical arrived betwixt August and October.

The authorities says it wants to trim the outgo of lodging asylum seekers arsenic determination are presently astir 51,000 asylum seekers successful hotels crossed the UK, costing the payer astir £6m a day.

"We proceed to enactment crossed authorities and with section authorities to look astatine a scope of accommodation options," a Home Office spokesperson said.

"Accommodation offered to asylum seekers, connected a nary prime basis, meets our ineligible and contractual requirements."

Meanwhile, the Home Office expects to nonstop an archetypal 50 radical to the UK's archetypal floating barge for asylum seekers successful the coming days.

A authorities root confirmed the Home Office intended to nonstop the radical to committee the Bibby Stockholm barge successful Portland, Dorset, connected Tuesday.

The determination is going up contempt protests astir the barge, which is designed to trim the usage of hotels for radical waiting connected asylum claims.

A Home Office spokeswoman said: "The Bibby Stockholm has completed a statutory inspection and refurbishment and is present berthing successful Portland.

"The payment of those successful our attraction is of the utmost precedence and the barge is present undergoing last preparations to guarantee it complies with each due regulations earlier the accomplishment of the archetypal asylum seekers successful the coming weeks."