British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has admitted that he would not want a migrant hotel near his family’s home, as his government houses over 30,000 supposed asylum seekers in hotels in communities across the country.
Hotel migrants for thee, but not for me appears to be the new credo of Downing Street as Prime Minister Starmer continues to struggle to grapple with mounting public anger over the mass migration agenda imposed upon Britain by both Westminster establishment parties.
Speaking with BBC Radio 5 Live’s Matt Chorley on Tuesday, Starmer attempted to relate to Joe Public by claiming that he understood that immigration is a “really serious issue”.
“We have to have control of our borders, and I completely get it, and I’m determined that whether it’s people crossing in the first place, whether it’s people in asylum hotels, or whether it’s returning people, we absolutely have to deal with this,” the Labour PM said per the Independent.
When pressed on whether he would feel comfortable if a hotel was commandeered to house migrants near his family’s home, Starmer said: “Local people by and large do not want these hotels in their towns, in their place, nor do I. I’m completely at one with them on that.”
While the prime minister has said he hopes to accelerate the shutdown of the migrant hotel scheme before his government’s original 2029 planned end date, he has so far refused to commit to a new timeframe. The PM said that he wants asylum hotels “emptied” and that he understood “why people are so concerned about it”.
At present, there are over 32,000 alleged asylum seekers being housed at British taxpayer expense in over 200 hotels dotted across the UK.
Nevertheless, it has been his government which has argued that the rights of supposed asylum seekers and the requirements for the government to house them outweigh the rights of locals to decide who lives in their midst.
This argument put forward by the Home Office successfully overturned a temporary injunction to shut down the asylum-housing Bell Hotel in Epping, which sparked nationwide protests in June after an illegal Ethiopian living in the hotel was accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl from the Essex town.
The local Epping Forrest council suffered another blow on Tuesday, as the same Court of Appeal that overturned the injunction to shut down the hotel ruled that the council could not appeal the decision to the Supreme Court, the BBC reports.
The Court of Appeal decision has come under scrutiny, with critics claiming that the lead judge in the case, Lord Justice Bean, may have had a conflict of interest given his longstanding prior membership in the Labour Party and his ties to pro-mass migration groups, such as the socialist Fabian Society.
However, the council still has legal options remaining, including a planned October High Court hearing for a potential permanent injunction. The local government said that it is also considering plans to apply directly to the Supreme Court in the meantime.
The outcome of the case is likely to have national ramifications, with at least 19 other councils planning legal action to attempt to shut down migrant hotels in their areas.
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