Anti-migrant protesters waving Union flags faced off with counter-demonstrators in Portsmouth city centre today as police brace for a weekend of rallies.
Police watched as people on each side gathered on the steps outside the council offices in the Hampshire city.
One protester tied a large flag of St George to the balcony which had on it the words ‘Born in England, Live in England, Die in England’.
The counter protesters also put up a banner, saying ‘Refugees Welcome, Celebrate Diversity’.
Protester Mat Silva, 66, a retired car sprayer from Fareham, said: ‘I am fed up seeing those who come into our country illegally being housed better than our veterans and our OAPs.
‘They get free accommodation, gas, electricity, four meals a day, while our veterans are on the street.’
He added: ‘Look how many millions it’s costing each day – if they are genuine asylum seekers or refugees coming in the right way with passports, then fair enough, it’s nothing to do with racism, it’s about people entering illegally.’
A woman who did not want to give her name said: ‘Family homes are being turned into houses of multiple occupancy. We have to live in an area where there are more and more new immigrants.’
Anti-migrant protesters gathering in Guildhall Square in Portsmouth this afternoon
Protesters carrying Union flags and St George’s Crosses in Portsmouth today
One counter-protester held a banner that claimed Jesus was a ‘socialist migrant’
Rita, from Portsmouth, who joined the Stand Up To Racism counter protest, said: ‘I am sick and tired of being someone who defends rapists and paedophiles, what I defend is human rights.
‘I feel ashamed (at the protest) and I say this as a white British elderly lady who has been spat upon, verbally abused and things thrown at, just for being on this side of the road.
‘I am angry that my Christianity is being used as a weapon by the right and to be used in the name of fascism.’
Mary, from Portsmouth, said: ‘I believe in dignity, equality and giving people a fair chance.
‘We have all come from somewhere originally, I am from Northern Ireland and we all came from Africa originally.
‘I am really upset at the violent way in which these other people are intimidating people who have fled intimidation all of their lives and are facing it here again, it’s completely wrong.’
Police enforced a gap between the two groups as the anti-immigrant group chanted ‘Send them home’ while the counter group chanted: ‘Refugees are welcome here.’
Portsmouth City Council previously told the Home Office it did not have capacity to take any more asylum seekers – only for hundreds to be moved into the city centre without their knowledge.
Protesters who gathered today at Guildhall Square in the centre of Portsmouth
Police enforced a gap between the two groups as the anti-immigrant group chanted ‘Send them home’ while the counter group chanted: ‘Refugees are welcome here’
A man wearing an England flag while walking a Dalmatian
The authority found that 55 private rental properties were being used to house a minimum of three asylum seekers each last week.
The migrants have been staying in homes of multiple occupation (HMO) – not council housing.
It came just two years after James Hill, Portsmouth’s director of housing, told the Home Office that the ‘system’s capacity was such that we couldn’t support additional asylum seekers’.
But when a public meeting was hosted in July by Amanda Martin, the Labour MP for Portsmouth North, figures showed the number of private rentals being used to house migrants had increased from 10 at the end of 2019 to 58 in April 2024, The Times first reported.
The council confirmed with the Home Office last week that the number is now at 55, according to the newspaper.
The data was uncovered by Ms Martin after Clearsprings Ready Homes wrote to a parliamentary committee this year amid an inquiry into accommodation for asylum seekers.
Portsmouth City Council said it was never notified about the use of the properties to house migrants.
A wave of protests are set to sweep the country this weekend targeting migrant hotels.
Further protests are expected outside migrant hotels across the country this weekend
One protester had a large flag of St George which had on it the words ‘Born in England, Live in England, Die in England’
Two other men held a banner reading: ‘House our own before illegals’
Anti-immigration campaigners are looking to ride on the back of this week’s landmark judgment that saw the High Court order the removal of migrants from a hotel in Epping, Essex.
Protests at up to 30 hotels are believed to be planned as communities seek to replicate the ruling for The Bell Hotel, which, pending an appeal, must be closed within weeks.
The hotel had been at the centre of protests after an asylum seeker living there was charged with sexually assaulting a teenage girl, which he denies.
Hotels in Cannock, Chichester and Tamworth are among those expected to be targeted by demonstrations, with anti-racism groups already organising counter-protests in 15 locations across the three-day Bank Holiday weekend.
They are prepared to turn up tonight in the likes of Bournemouth, Portsmouth, Leicester, Leeds, Orpington, Perth, Aberdeen and Altrincham.
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has used Epping as a rallying cry, saying: ‘Let’s hold peaceful protests outside hotels and put pressure on councils to go to court to try to get illegal immigrants out.’
On Tuesday, a judge granted a temporary injunction against migrants being housed at The Bell Hotel after Epping Forest council argued that it was necessary for ‘the safety of nearby residents’ and to reduce the threat of ‘violent protests‘.
As it tried, unsuccessfully, to intervene in the case at the eleventh hour, the Home Office argued that granting Epping’s application ‘runs the risk of acting as an impetus for further violent protests’.
These banners referred to Councillor Steve Pitt, leader of the local council
Protesters gathering on Guildhall Square this afternoon
A man carrying a ‘stop the far right’ banner at today’s Portsmouth protest
The ruling threatens to collapse Labour’s asylum system as protesters take to the streets and councils across the country prepare to hit the Home Office with copycat litigation over the use of hotels in their areas.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has written to all Conservative councils pledging support for any legal action, while Reform UK’s leaders have encouraged people to protest at their local asylum hotels.
But anti-racism groups have warned the ruling sets a ‘dangerous precedent’, with Stand Up To Racism saying that it will ’embolden the far-Right to call more protests outside hotels housing refugees’.
Labour grandee Lord Falconer urged the Home Office to appeal against the Epping judgment on Thursday as he admitted the ruling ’causes great problems’ for the Government.
The peer, who served as justice secretary under Sir Tony Blair and as Sir Keir Starmer’s shadow attorney general, said it ‘gives rise to the expectation that some asylum hotels can be closed’.
Lord Falconer said the ruling presents Labour with a ‘very troublesome issue, namely does demonstrations outside these hotels lead to it being more likely that they will be closed’.
Urging the Government ‘very strongly’ to appeal, he told Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘It puts the courts and the politicians in a difficult position.
