Taxpayers are spending millions for asylum seekers to receive “at home” medical assessments inside hotels as the NHS scrambles to deal with the number of migrants entering Britain.
An Express investigation has uncovered data from across the country showing how an increase in migration to Britain since 2021 has forced the health service to strike deals with local GP practices.
The failure of the Government to tackle the crisis and support the NHS has been branded a “betrayal” of the British people as millions struggle to see a doctor.
Migration Watch director Mike Jones said: “British patients are waiting over 18 months for vital treatments, yet migrant hotels are being turned into makeshift surgeries.
“This isn’t just a health crisis – it’s a betrayal of taxpayers who’ve spent their lives funding the NHS, only to be shoved to the back of the queue.
“If Labour is serious about putting an end to this chaos, they’ll have to amend the Human Rights Act to allow mass deportations of illegal immigrants.
“If they don’t, GPs will continue to be blindsided by the influx of thousands of asylum seekers, while British patients suffer agonising delays in a health system already stretched to breaking point.”
Contracts seen by the Express include a £1.9 million deal where NHS Sussex was informed “with less than four weeks’ notice” that it would need to provide health services to 1,000 asylum seekers.
Those numbers then rose to almost 3,000 migrants in hotels across Brighton, Crawley, Eastbourne, and Hastings just months later.
In October, a federation of local GP practices in Cheshire won a £132,000 contract to provide “at-home” care for migrants in the town of Halton.
This is despite elderly patients at some of the surgeries within the group having to wait a month for an appointment.
William Yarwood, media campaign manager at the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Taxpayers will feel sick when they see the access illegal migrants are getting to our healthcare system.
“While millions sit on NHS waiting lists and are forced to suffer, illegal migrants are enjoying ‘at home care’ in their hotels.
“The government needs to get a grip on boat crossings immediately, otherwise the cost to Britain will only continue to climb.”
The findings come after new data from the Office of National Statistics revealed net migration has reached “unprecedented levels” over the past four years.
Since 2021, a total of 2.7 million non-EU migrants have been added to the UK population with a record 906,000 coming last year alone.
The new Labour government has already seen 20,000 small boat migrant arrivals since taking office and at the end of September, 35,651 asylum seekers were recorded as being housed in UK hotels, a rise of more than 6,000.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp claimed the Express’s findings were “another example of Keir Starmer’s soft touch approach to illegal migration that has resulted in more channel crossings”.
He added: “Residents will rightly be furious that they have to go out of their way to see a GP but those in asylum hotels are receiving a silver service at the expense of the taxpayer.”
Reform MP Lee Anderson said: “The Tories opened our borders to illegal immigration and now Labour are rolling out the red carpet.
“People who have illegally entered our country should be deported, they shouldn’t have better health services than the rest of the country.”
As of September, around 6.3 million patients were stuck waiting for treatment around half of whom have been waiting over 18 weeks, according to an analysis by the British Medical Association.
In Halton, Cheshire, two of the surgeries within the GP Health Connect federation, contracted to deliver at-home treatment for asylum seekers in local hotels, were ranked as “needing improvement” in responsiveness healthcare regulator the CQC.
Elderly patients who spoke to Express reporters outside these units, who described month-long waits for appointments, said they felt “thrown under the bus” by the deal.
“Someone needs to wake up and sort out the NHS,” retired tiler Jack Jones, 80, told the Express outside his local practice Brookvale in Runcorn.
“They can’t even help the people already on their books. First, there was Covid, now it’s asylum seekers. We are being thrown under a bus.
“They tell us there is no money but then they spend thousands on these asylum seekers. Don’t get me wrong, I do feel sorry for them and I’m not biased against them personally, but I believe we should look after British people first.”
Under UK law, migrants have the right to access healthcare while they wait for their claim to be processed. The burden of supplying it falls on the NHS Integrated Care Boards[ICB], the larger overarching bodies responsible for NHS planning, who are, in turn, contracting local GPs to provide care.
Enver Solomon, CEO of the Refugee Council, said: “The NHS was founded on the principle that anyone who needs treatment can receive it free at the point of need. Diseases and illnesses affect everyone, regardless of who we are and what our immigration status might be, and it also spreads indiscriminately, which means when one person loses access to healthcare, that clearly becomes a problem for us all.
“That’s why the NHS treats everyone, and we welcome the fact that Britain’s nurses and doctors – many of whom come from migrant and refugee backgrounds themselves – provide healthcare for those seeking asylum, so they can access essential medical support when they need it.”
In addition to the deals struck by Sussex and Cheshire and Merseyside’s ICBs, the Express found Leicestershire signed a £19.8 million 10-year contract with local healthcare provider The Inclusion Group in August this year to provide services for the homeless, asylum seekers and patients who could not be seen by their local GP.
The South West London ICB handed out a similar £47 million two-year contract to care for asylum seekers and the homeless in Merton and Wandsworth back in 2022.
We also found information on two west London GP practices, in Hounslow and Chiswick, being paid for handling the healthcare needs of migrants in hotels two years ago.
Responding to the Express investigation a government spokesperson said: “The Home Office and its contractors work closely with the NHS, local authorities and non-governmental organisations to ensure that people can access the health care and support they need, while protecting local services. “Decisions on individual contracts are a matter for local NHS commissioners.
“This government is determined to fix the front door of our health service which has been underfunded for years and ensure everyone can access GP services.”
A spokesperson for NHS Cheshire and Merseyside said: “We have a legal duty to provide safe and appropriate healthcare to asylum seekers and follow the relevant national guidance and recommendations to ensure they receive the care they need.”
NHS Sussex claimed its deal with GP Federation Alliance for Better Care had no effect on the services of other residents in the region. “This additional service ensures that the immediate and urgent needs of this vulnerable community are understood and supported, without impacting on health and care services available for all residents of Sussex,” a spokesperson added.
