Afghan refugees moved out of hotels

Afghan families given refuge by the UK are facing homelessness after being told by the government to move out of hotels, councils have told the BBC.

The families, many of whom worked for the British government, came to the UK after the Taliban takeover in 2021.

Thousands are still living in temporary government-funded hotel accommodation – but are now beginning to be moved out.

Cabinet Office Minister Johnny Mercer has said he will have failed if any of them end up living on the streets.

“That has not happened. And that is not going to happen,” he told the BBC.

However, those that cannot find permanent homes will be classed as homeless and the responsibility of local councils.

Councils say some families have already presented as homeless this week. The Local Government Association (LGA) said one in five Afghans leaving hotels were presenting to local authorities as homeless.

It said Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire were particularly affected, but Southampton, Basingstoke, Devon and Essex would also be impacted in the coming weeks and months.

One authority in Essex said it had nine families now facing homelessness.

In Milton Keynes, the council has received 32 homelessness referrals so far.

Councils fear more will follow, putting pressure on already squeezed local authorities who have a legal duty to find accommodation for homeless people.

The families were given three months notice in April to leave the hotels.

Mr Mercer added that the government had done “a huge amount of work” to get Afghans into long-term, sustainable accommodation and that this was “what’s best for them and what’s best for British taxpayers”.

The Home Office said it had provided £285m funding to help with the transition, and was running schemes to help more Afghan families find permanent homes.

Councils say the government funding is not enough and although accommodation will be found for the refugees, it may mean they have to move hundreds of miles to other hotels.

Stephen Robinson, the Liberal Democrat leader of Chelmsford City Council, said his housing officers had to find accommodation for nine Afghan families, totalling 60 people.

“They were offered the chance to come to the UK because of their loyalty to the British government and they have been stuck in hotels for the last year, 18 months, and now they are being moved out,” he told BBC News.

The families had highly qualified people who wanted to contribute to British society, he added, and had found work and schools for their children.

“They are all becoming homeless next week and we have a statutory responsibility to put them into temporary accommodation,” he said.

The council already has to deal with 430 homeless households in Chelmsford, said Mr Robinson, and there was a lack of accommodation.

“We warned the government that this would be a problem and they just covered their ears. They didn’t want to think about the end game,” he told the BBC.

“We have a moral duty to those who worked for the British government to look after them properly and we have, as a country, this government, has let them down.”

Shaun Davies, a councillor and chairman of the Local Government Association, said councils shared the Home Office’s determination to get Afghan families out of hotels and into permanent homes.

However, he added: “It is wrong that some families are having to leave Home Office-funded hotels only to then end up having to move into temporary accommodation.”

“With record numbers of households already living in temporary accommodation and an acute shortage of housing across the country, this is adding huge pressure onto councils on the ground and disruption and distress for families, some of whom are particularly vulnerable,” he said.

“This situation is likely to worsen significantly as the Home Office stops paying for the remaining bridging hotels for Afghan families in the coming days and weeks.”

He said the government should continue to pay for hotel places for those families struggling to find accommodation.

Mr Davies warned that hotels should not be closed to Afghan refugees only to “switch to becoming hotels for other new arrivals”.

Labour MP Dan Jarvis, a former soldier who served in Afghanistan, said the idea Afghans were being “forced to become homeless” was “shameful”.

“These are not economic migrants – these are Afghans who placed themselves in mortal peril in order to serve alongside British forces in Afghanistan, and they did so at our request,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

Reports /TrainViral/