Record numbers of asylum seekers are languishing in hotels across the UK, leading refugee-supporting groups to highlight the dangers of long-term living in temporary accommodation.
The population of asylum seekers in Britain's hotels had almost tripled throughout 2021, with 26,380 people, 2,500 of them children, living in 207 hotels.
According to a recent Refugee Council report, the Home Office has failed to deliver on its plans to move people from hotels into dispersal lodging and is instead leaving families in limbo, with limited access to vital health, legal and other support services.
‘Lives on Hold: The Experiences of People in Hotel Asylum Accommodation', released as a follow-up to a similar report by the charity last year, reveals that men, women and children are spending increased periods of time in what was meant to be temporary accommodation, a situation providing further evidence of the UK’s damaged asylum system, the Refugee Council's chief executive says.
“We are deeply disappointed that despite government promises to move people out of hotels, the numbers of men, women and children trapped in unsuitable hotel accommodation has trebled in a year alone," said Enver Solomon. "The huge increase in the number of families and vulnerable children stuck between the four walls of a hotel room, from morning till night, is the brutal reality of a broken system."
A comparison with figures from two years previously shows a worrying over-reliance on temporary accommodation to house an increasing number of migrants.
In 2019, the government used 24 hotels to house 1,490 supported asylum seekers but by the end of 2020, 100 were being used to accommodate 11,076.
The duration of hotel stays is also on the rise.
Figures revealed in the Refugee Council report suggest that by the end of 2021, nearly 400 people had been living in hotel rooms for a year and almost 3,000 for more than six months.
But the scale of the issue is already significantly greater this year.
Record numbers of migrants crossing from France in small boats are expected to add even greater pressure to the UK's housing problems. As of early July, provisional government figures show that 13,749 migrants have made the crossing so far this year.
The evacuation of about 18,000 Afghans and British citizens to the UK under 'Operation Pitting’ in August 2021 is also likely to add to the country’s housing waiting list.
As of June this year, the Home Office confirmed that slightly more than 6,000 Afghans had been moved into permanent housing in the previous year, meaning thousands are still waiting in hotels across the country for a place to call home.
The government this year revealed that the taxpayer cost of housing asylum seekers and those evacuated from Afghanistan was nearly £5 million a day, or £1.8 billion a year.
A number of Afghan refugees who arrived in the UK last year have told The National of their frustration and despondency at living in hotels for prolonged periods.
One young woman who wishes to remain anonymous has been moved with her elderly parent to three different hotels within a year. She spoke of how unsettled she felt and how her living situation was limiting her ability to study or work.
She felt that the treatment of hotel staff towards her and her fellow refugee occupants was at times antagonistic, which left them feeling unwelcome.
These concerns are echoed in the Refugee Council report, which underlines the charity’s long-standing concerns over the effects of being housed in hotels for long periods on people’s health and well-being. Mr Solomon said depression was rife.
“Far from the glitzy hotels people may imagine, these are not places anyone would want to stay in for long periods; they are cramped and unsafe," he said. "Hotel stays are days, weeks, months, and in some cases a year, stuck in limbo, cut off from society, unable to find work, with children often missing out on vital education.
"The impact of this on people who have already endured extreme suffering is huge, damaging their mental health, robbing children of their childhood and leaving people unable to progress with their lives in any meaningful way, or participate in the lives of their communities.”
The report highlights cases of people with inadequate access to clothing, appropriate footwear and other basic essentials such as basic medicine, mobile phones and internet data.
The Refugee Council’s investigation suggests that many of those living in such accommodation have limited access to the vital legal and health services they desperately need while claiming asylum, and are cut off from the rest of society and support networks.
Refugees are often living in unsafe environments, due to an increase in far-right activity, regular harassment of people living in asylum hotels and the risks of people being trafficked from such establishments.
Mr Solomon said the UK government’s plans to outsource asylum seekers to Rwanda fails to address the problem.
“The government is deflecting its failures with cruel and unworkable policies like that of the Rwanda scheme, rather than focusing on creating a fair, effective and humane asylum system which addresses the backlog of people trapped in the asylum system," he said. "The government must ensure swift decisions are made so that those who have protection needs can stay in this country as a refugee, and those who do not can be supported to safely return to the country from which they came.”
TOUCH RULES
Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.
Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.
Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.
A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.
After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.
At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.
A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.
Company profile
Name: One Good Thing
Founders: Bridgett Lau and Micheal Cooke
Based in: Dubai
Sector: e-commerce
Size: 5 employees
Stage: Looking for seed funding
Investors: Self-funded and seeking external investors
500 People from Gaza enter France
115 Special programme for artists
25 Evacuation of injured and sick
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
Red flags
- Promises of high, fixed or 'guaranteed' returns.
- Unregulated structured products or complex investments often used to bypass traditional safeguards.
- Lack of clear information, vague language, no access to audited financials.
- Overseas companies targeting investors in other jurisdictions - this can make legal recovery difficult.
- Hard-selling tactics - creating urgency, offering 'exclusive' deals.
Courtesy: Carol Glynn, founder of Conscious Finance Coaching
Mobile phone packages comparison
if you go
The flights
Emirates flies to Delhi with fares starting from around Dh760 return, while Etihad fares cost about Dh783 return. From Delhi, there are connecting flights to Lucknow.
Where to stay
It is advisable to stay in Lucknow and make a day trip to Kannauj. A stay at the Lebua Lucknow hotel, a traditional Lucknowi mansion, is recommended. Prices start from Dh300 per night (excluding taxes).
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Lexus LX700h specs
Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh590,000
SPECS
Engine: 4-litre V8 twin-turbo
Power: 630hp
Torque: 850Nm
Transmission: 8-speed Tiptronic automatic
Price: From Dh599,000
On sale: Now
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Game Changer
Director: Shankar
Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram
Rating: 2/5
Tips for used car buyers
- Choose cars with GCC specifications
- Get a service history for cars less than five years old
- Don’t go cheap on the inspection
- Check for oil leaks
- Do a Google search on the standard problems for your car model
- Do your due diligence. Get a transfer of ownership done at an official RTA centre
- Check the vehicle’s condition. You don’t want to buy a car that’s a good deal but ends up costing you Dh10,000 in repairs every month
- Validate warranty and service contracts with the relevant agency and and make sure they are valid when ownership is transferred
- If you are planning to sell the car soon, buy one with a good resale value. The two most popular cars in the UAE are black or white in colour and other colours are harder to sell
Tarek Kabrit, chief executive of Seez, and Imad Hammad, chief executive and co-founder of CarSwitch.com
In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
Seven tips from Emirates NBD
1. Never respond to e-mails, calls or messages asking for account, card or internet banking details
2. Never store a card PIN (personal identification number) in your mobile or in your wallet
3. Ensure online shopping websites are secure and verified before providing card details
4. Change passwords periodically as a precautionary measure
5. Never share authentication data such as passwords, card PINs and OTPs (one-time passwords) with third parties
6. Track bank notifications regarding transaction discrepancies
7. Report lost or stolen debit and credit cards immediately
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
BELGIUM%20SQUAD
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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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The%20specs%3A%202024%20Mercedes%20E200
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The specs: 2019 BMW X4
Price, base / as tested: Dh276,675 / Dh346,800
Engine: 3.0-litre turbocharged in-line six-cylinder
Transmission: Eight-speed automatic
Power: 354hp @ 5,500rpm
Torque: 500Nm @ 1,550rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 9.0L / 100km
yallacompare profile
Date of launch: 2014
Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer
Based: Media City, Dubai
Sector: Financial services
Size: 120 employees
Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)
THE BIO
Favourite author - Paulo Coelho
Favourite holiday destination - Cuba
New York Times or Jordan Times? NYT is a school and JT was my practice field
Role model - My Grandfather
Dream interviewee - Che Guevara
The biog
Favourite food: Tabbouleh, greek salad and sushi
Favourite TV show: That 70s Show
Favourite animal: Ferrets, they are smart, sensitive, playful and loving
Favourite holiday destination: Seychelles, my resolution for 2020 is to visit as many spiritual retreats and animal shelters across the world as I can
Name of first pet: Eddy, a Persian cat that showed up at our home
Favourite dog breed: I love them all - if I had to pick Yorkshire terrier for small dogs and St Bernard's for big
Zidane's managerial achievements
La Liga: 2016/17
Spanish Super Cup: 2017
Uefa Champions League: 2015/16, 2016/17, 2017/18
Uefa Super Cup: 2016, 2017
Fifa Club World Cup: 2016, 2017
