Ministers are spending more than half a million pounds a day on keeping thousands of empty hotel beds reserved for migrants as a “buffer” to prevent overcrowding at processing centres.
The 5,000 beds are needed in case there is a surge in migrant crossings, Home Office sources say.
Over the past three days 1,339 migrants have crossed the Channel in small boats, taking the total for this year to 12,772, roughly the same number that had arrived by this time last year, despite Rishi Sunak’s claim last month that his plan to stop the boats was “starting to work”.
Almost 10,000 migrants who have arrived since March will no longer be subject to strict new measures in the Illegal Migration Bill after the government agreed a concession to drop retrospective application of the legislation.
The amendment is one of four that the government has offered to get the bill on the statute book by the end of next week as MPs prepare to vote on up to 20 changes made by the House of Lords last week.
Ministers have now said the legislation will only apply retrospectively on a measure to ban deported migrants from ever re-entering the UK.
It means that the 9,689 migrants who have arrived by small boats since March 7 — the date the legislation was presented — will no longer face detention and removal from the UK and will have their claim for asylum heard by the Home Office.
The bill’s measures will now take effect from the day it receives royal assent, expected next week.
The government is seeking to overturn 15 of the 20 amendments that the Lords pushed through to soften the bill. It has also offered concessions that will limit the detention of unaccompanied children to eight days, though this does not match the 24-hour limit voted through by the Lords and may trigger a revolt by some Tory MPs tonight.
The government has, however, accepted an amendment that will limit the detention of pregnant migrants to 72 hours. Two other technical amendments are being brought forward, including one that limits the definition of “serious and irreversible harm” that can be used by migrants to avoid removal.
Ministers have refused to offer concessions on proposals to ban migrants from claiming protections under modern slavery laws, which could provoke a rebellion from several prominent Conservatives including the former party leaders Theresa May and Sir Iain Duncan Smith.
After tabling the amendments last night Suella Braverman, the home secretary, said: “This bill forms a crucial part of our action to stop the boats and ensure people do not risk their lives by making illegal and unnecessary journeys to the UK. Today’s amendments will help this crucial legislation pass through parliament swiftly, whilst continuing to send a clear message that the exploitation of children and vulnerable people . . . cannot continue.”
Home Office officials told parliament’s public accounts committee yesterday that the department’s buffer of 5,000 empty hotel beds was important to avoid overcrowding at the Manston processing centre in Kent. The contingency is to avoid a repeat of overcrowding at the site last autumn when a shortage of hotel rooms led to more than 4,000 people — more than triple its capacity — being housed at one point, leading to an outbreak of diphtheria and other diseases.
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The nightly average cost of housing a migrant in a hotel bed is about £109 per person, meaning the department is spending more than £500,000 of taxpayers’ money a day on empty beds.
Sir Brandon Lewis, the former immigration minister, issued a warning in a foreword to a Policy Exchange think tank report about the cost of accommodating migrants, saying it “risks fuelling public resentment, especially in some of the most deprived and left-behind parts of the UK”.
The report said that the £2.2 billion cost of housing migrants in hotels was now higher than the government’s levelling-up fund and triple the £680 million it was spending on the fight against homelessness.
It has driven the total cost of tackling the small boats crisis to £3.5 billion a year. Almost two thirds of those crossing the Channel last year were men aged 18 to 39.
Downing Street said yesterday that the numbers crossing the Channel were “still too large” and warned that they could rise further over the summer. The prime minister’s spokesman added: “That’s why we need the other elements of our ‘stop the boats’ package.”
Sunak claimed last month that his plan to stop the boats was “starting to work”, citing figures showing crossings were down 20 per cent compared with last year. But a month on, the number of crossings has surged and is now only 4 per cent lower than this time last year.
