Downing Street will reportedly ramp up efforts to stop housing asylum seekers in hotels as they worry the policy has seen voters support Reform UK’s opposition to it.
Senior Labour politicians believe the approach is having a negative effect on the government’s popularity and is playing directly into Nigel Farage‘s hands, according to The Telegraph.
Taxpayers across the country are said to be furious as around £2billion per year is splurged on migrant accommodation, with an estimated 38,000 migrants housed in more than 200 hotels.
And Farage, who yesterday saw his party storm the local elections and take control of ten councils, has promised to help ‘enraged’ locals in Reform-held areas as asylum seekers are ‘dumped’ in their communities.
He said: ‘People are so enraged because they get up early in the morning, they go to work, they pay their taxes and they see young men crossing the English Channel, being dumped in the north of England, getting everything for free, and then once they are given indefinite leave to remain, put to the top of the social housing list.
‘It is unfair. It is irresponsible. It is wrong in every way and I don’t believe Starmer has got the guts to deal with it.
‘We, at the national level, have got the guts to deal with it and we will resist central Government plonking hundreds of these young men in these counties that we now control.’
After Labour’s high-profile cuts to winter fuel payments and disability benefits, there are growing fears in the party that disillusioned voters are now questioning why such a large portion of funding is being funneled into housing asylum seekers.
Downing Street will reportedly ramp up efforts to stop housing asylum seekers in hotels as they worry that the policy has seen voters support Reform UK’s opposition to it
Senior Labour politicians believe the approach is having a negative effect on the government’s popularity and is playing directly into Nigel Farage’s hands
A group of males is seen outside one of the hotels currently housing migrants in November
While the government has legal duties to ensure refugees seeking asylum are cared for in the UK, figures at Downing Street will allegedly look to force the Home Office into taking quicker action.
Labour have already reduced the number of migrant hotels from a peak of around 400, but they will look to cut it even further.
Although councils do not have the ability to veto the use of hotels for housing migrants, Mr Farage said that he would urge his newly elected politicians to push to close down such schemes.
He told The Telegraph: ‘We are going to fight very hard to do so. We will resist, resist, resist.
‘People hate them. They see a sense of total unfairness that they are working themselves to bits to pay tax for young men who can illegally come into the country and be given everything for free.
A worried group previously gathered in Manchester to protest against asylum seekers being housed locally
Anti-immigration protesters clashed with members of Stand Up To Racism outside Cresta Court Hotel in Altrincham
‘It is a sense of unfairness now bordering on a sense of anger. Our voters won’t want it.’
It comes after Sir Keir Starmer faced calls from various Labour MPs to urgently change tact after Labour slumped to its joint worst vote share at a local election.
The Prime Minister was even urged to rethink net zero by figures within his own party earlier this week after Sir Tony Blair attacked his green agenda.
This raised questions over Ed Miliband’s survival in Cabinet, but Downing Street insiders have allegedly insisted there will be no change to their net zero policy.
The Prime Minister was even urged to rethink net zero by figures within his own party earlier this week after Sir Tony Blair attacked his green agenda – this raised questions over Ed Miliband’s survival in Cabinet
Responding to his critics, the Prime Minister said: ‘The message I take away from these results is we must deliver that change even more quickly, we must go even further.’
However, Labour MP Diane Abbott Labour MP said Starmer was not understanding the problems looming over the party.
She said: ‘Labour leadership [is] saying the party will go further and faster in the same direction. They don’t seem to understand that it is our current direction that is the problem.’
MailOnline has approached the Home Office for comment.
