Government defends prospect of paying more for barracks than for hotel accommodation
Downing Street has defended the prospect of paying more to house asylum seekers in disused barracks instead of hotels, arguing that quelling public disquiet was worth any extra cost.
As refugee organisations and local politicians described plans to house tens of thousands of people in ex-military sites as “fanciful” and “too expensive”, No 10 said that “communities don’t want asylum seekers housed in hotels, and neither does the government”.
The comments came after the Home Office confirmed on Tuesday that it planned to use the Cameron barracks in Inverness and Crowborough training camp in East Sussex to house 900 male asylum seekers from next month.
Officials said they would be the first of as many as 10,000 people the Home Office hoped to house on military sites as it worked with the Ministry of Defence to find more disused sites.
