Labour didn't create the asylum hotel mess - it will come as no surprise who did

When they started piling asylum seekers into hotels in 2020, the Tories insisted it was a temporary measure.

The Boris Johnson government blamed Covid, rising small boat crossings and a growing backlog. But the problem only got worse as they failed to get to grips with the asylum system, spending billions of pounds of taxpayers' cash on a sticking plaster solution.

By 2023, when Rishi Sunak was in No10, there were more than 56,000 migrants living in hotels and the backlog was an enormous 175,000. Robert Jenrick, who was Immigration Minister at the time, even bragged during a TV interview that he had "ramped up" securing hotel rooms to cope with the growing backlog.

Figures released by the Home Office this morning reveal this had dropped to 32,059 - 43% below the peak under the Conservatives. It is a small fall since March, but has gone up by 8% in the past year.

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Experts say the Conservative reliance on the failed Rwanda scheme, which was announced under Mr Johnson, and a string of botched legislation was a "failure of public policy". Labour has vowed to end the use of asylum hotels and tackle the backlog - but face growing pressure to do so quickly.

In March 2020 there were around 1,200 people in hotels. By the summer this had reached 4,400, and it had soared to 9,500 by October that year. In March 2023, when Rishi Sunak was PM, the number was 47,518, peaking at 56,042 in the autumn.

This was costing an enormous £9million a day, with around 400 hotels being used. The Government has a legal duty to house destitute asylum seekers while their applications are processed. The UK lost the legal right to return people to mainland Europe when it left the EU, but a new 'one in one out' returns deal with France is being trialled.

Imran Hussain, from the Refugee Council, said: "Nobody thinks asylum seekers should be kept in hotels while their case is being assessed. It's very expensive. It's not good for the asylum seekers. It's isolating. It's an isolating experience I think even before the protests, with the protests it's incredibly terrifying for people.

"And of course as we've seen for local communities, there's a lot of tension, some of which is being exploited by people on the far- right. So no one thinks it's a good idea."

He said a "failure of public policy" led to the Tories resorting to using asylum hotels as a massive backlog swelled to a peak of 175,000 in 2023.

Mr Hussain said: "For 20 odd years that we've supported asylum seekers through, the system worked perfectly well. We had accommodation for people without using hotels. But the last few years there's been a huge backlog of cases that's grown up because the previous government (the Tories) stopped making decisions on cases because it wanted to send people to Rwanda.

"The backlog has meant the accommodation that was existing was full and people have had to use hotels." Shadow justice secretary Mr Jenrick has been vocal on the issue in recent days, saying he would support councils mounting legal challenges over asylum hotels in their area.

But he faced embarrassment over a resurfaced interview from his time in government, in which he boasted: "More hotels have been coming online almost every month throughout the whole of this year. So Suella Braverman and her predecessor Priti Patel were securing more hotels. What I have done in my short tenure is ramp that up and secure even more."

Current Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has been branded "desperate and hypocritical" after kicking off over the asylum hotel mess her party caused.

The under-fire Tory leader called on Conservative-controlled councils to launch legal challenges over hotels as the Home Office faces a massive headache. In a letter to Tory councils, Mrs Badenoch said she was "encouraging" them to "take the same steps" as Epping Council "if your legal advice supports it".

A Labour spokesperson said Mrs Badenoch's letter was a "pathetic stunt" and "desperate and hypocritical nonsense from the architects of the broken asylum system", saying there were now "20,000 fewer asylum seekers in hotels than at their peak under the Tories".

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