Manston migrant centre: What are the problems?

Home Secretary Suella Braverman is nether unit to reply questions astir conditions astatine a migrant processing centre astatine Manston successful Kent.

There are present thousands of migrants astatine the campy and section Conservative MP Roger Gale says "it is overwhelmed and it is wholly unacceptable."

Manston, a erstwhile subject basal successful Kent, opened arsenic a processing centre successful February 2022, for the increasing fig of migrants reaching the UK successful tiny boats.

In December 2021, the Home Office said it would clasp "illegal migrants ...for up to 5 days arsenic information and individuality checks are completed".

It said it was portion of a caller migration program that would "see a determination distant from unsustainable edifice accommodation towards dedicated reception centres".

Last week, the Home Office said: "The purpose was to tally a tract that had betwixt 1,000 and 1,600 radical passing done it each day, and that each of those checks would beryllium completed successful nether 24 hours. For a ample portion of this year, that is precisely however it was operating".

There are presently astir 4,000 migrants astatine Manston, according to Mr Gale. The Home Office would not remark connected the existent numbers astatine the camp.

Some migrants are besides being held for longer periods of clip due to the fact that of an evident deficiency of alternate accommodation.

Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration David Neal visited the campy connected 24 October and said determination were 2,800 migrants determination connected that day.

He told MPs: "I spoke to an Afghan household who had been successful a marquee for 32 days."

He reported that migrants were being guarded by untrained custody officers and said: "What is truly concerning and alarming is that the numbers arsenic described are intelligibly outstripping the capableness of the site."

A Home Office spokesperson said: "Manston remains resourced and equipped to process migrants securely and we volition supply alternate accommodation arsenic soon arsenic possible."

The Times reported connected Saturday that Ms Braverman was told astatine slightest 3 weeks agone that migrants, including families, were being held determination for 4 weeks, putting the authorities successful breach of the law.

The BBC has been told that she was warned that the authorities was breaching statutory duties by failing to motion disconnected connected ways to instantly determination radical to hotels oregon alternate accommodation.

The BBC has spoken to sources acquainted with the situation. One root said determination was "crystal clear" proposal that the Govt was not acting wrong the law.

Mr Gale told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I was told that the Home Office was uncovering it precise hard to unafraid edifice accommodation. I present recognize that this was a argumentation contented and that a determination was taken not to publication further edifice space."

A Home Office spokesperson said: "The Home Secretary has taken urgent decisions to alleviate issues astatine Manston and root alternate accommodation. Claims proposal was deliberately ignored are wholly baseless."

At the extremity of June 2022 determination were almost 100,000 asylum claims waiting for an archetypal determination from the Home Office.

One crushed for the accrued backlog - which is 2 and a fractional times higher than astatine the extremity of 2019 - is the emergence successful fig of asylum applications.

In 2021, determination were 48,450 applications, compared to 63,089 truthful acold successful 2022. Large increases successful tiny vessel crossings person driven this trend.

A Home Affairs Committee report published implicit the summertime said that "antiquated IT systems, precocious unit turnover, and excessively fewer unit are among the reasons for this dilatory pace".

The asylum backlog has near thousands of asylum seekers waiting successful abbreviated word accommodation - specified arsenic hotels - which is costing the authorities astir £5.6m per day.

The unit successful the asylum strategy worsened during the pandemic arsenic radical were prevented from being moved connected to semipermanent accommodation due to the fact that of the lockdown.

The Home Affairs Committee reported that successful September 2021,13,000 asylum seekers were surviving successful hotels.

The authorities uses different erstwhile airfield successful Kent - Western Jet Foil - arsenic a processing centre wherever archetypal checks instrumentality place. Another centre successful the region - Tughaven - was closed successful 2021.

Earlier this year, a processing centre was owed to unfastened successful the Yorkshire colony of Linton-on-Ouse. The connection was scrapped aft absorption from the section Conservative assembly

There are presently 7 migration removal centres located crossed England, Scotland and Northern Ireland which clasp radical who are astir to beryllium removed from the UK.

However, immoderate migrants person been sent present upon accomplishment erstwhile determination is nary abstraction astatine processing centres.

Other types of detention centres - specified arsenic short-term holding centres - are based successful Manchester and Northern Ireland.