‘We are dying little by little here’: asylum seekers at mercy of Home Office hotel closures | Immigration and asylum

Huda and her two children, aged 10 and 12, had been living in two rooms in a London hotel for six months and were told they would be moving with just a few days’ notice. The 41-year-old engineering graduate from Tunisia has escaped death threats from extended family and is awaiting the evaluation of his asylum application.

The Home Office had decided to close Staycity, the hotel where the family were staying, as part of the government’s commitment to move asylum seekers from hotels to military barracks or other shared housing. The move follows protests from anti-immigrant activists; many hotels were too luxurious to accommodate refugees.

On June 25, the Ministry of Internal Affairs announced the closure of 20 hotels, following the previous announcement that closed 11 hotels earlier this year. When asylum hotels are closed, people are either moved to other hotels where space is available, sent to military barracks, or given asylum.

A legal challenge has been launched on behalf of some people at the hotel over concerns about the government’s failure to assess individual vulnerabilities before mass evacuations.

The court order by deputy high court judge John Halford said it was “arguable” that the home secretary had failed to consider the “adequacy” of accommodation for asylum seekers to be moved from Staycity.

Huda’s 12-year-old daughter uses a wheelchair and has epilepsy and a heart condition. “I have so many different medical supplies to keep my daughter alive that they alone almost take up a room,” Huda said.

From 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., the family sat at the reception waiting to move into their new hotel. “The new hotel is much worse,” Huda said. “Here, my children and I are slowly dying. My daughter sleeps on the floor because she is afraid of the bunk bed. The new place is so cramped that there is no place to cook for my children.”

Ralitsa Peykova, an attorney with Deighton Pierce Glynn, a firm fighting against expedited evictions, said the government’s hotel closures were “complete chaos and a waste of taxpayers’ money.” “We had to take urgent legal action because our customers were moved from one hotel to another without an assessment of their needs,” he said.

While the Home Office has repeatedly cited the success of increased hotel closures, “the reality on the ground is very different and the human cost is high,” said Chloe White, chief executive of Action for Refugees, which is based in Lewisham, south-east London, and supports families moving from Staycity.

“With hotel closure after hotel closure, families are quickly being cut off from communities, support systems and specialist care,” he said.

“The room in the new hotel they moved us to is so small that I have to change my daughter’s diaper in the corridor. Her medicine needs to be kept in the refrigerator, but we don’t have any in the new place. I’m worried I won’t be able to keep her alive,” Huda said.

Another refugee at the hotel, Farhad, was given a Post-it note stating that he would be moving out the next day. No reason was given.

“The Home Office doesn’t care what happens to us,” he said. “I know someone at the hotel [who] “He was in the middle of chemotherapy treatment for cancer and was moved far away from the hospital where he was being treated.”

Farhad says he was a victim of human trafficking, torture and labor exploitation, and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.

“The Home Office does not take people’s suffering into account,” he said. “The hotel the Home Office has put me in will probably close soon and then I will be moved again. They moved me away from where I was receiving treatment because of my mental health problems.”

A second mother and her sons moved 349 miles away to Aberdeen two days before one of the boy’s vital A-level exams. She and her sons are devastated by the interruption of her son’s education.

A Home Office spokesman said: “This government will close all asylum hotels and work is underway to move asylum seekers to more suitable accommodation.

“The welfare of asylum seekers remains a priority and we will continue to work closely with providers to ensure additional needs are met and minimize disruption wherever possible.”