So-called “Sanctuary Cities” across the UK are actively promoting the inclusion of asylum seekers and offers them support, it has been reported. Initiatives and local organisations, including libraries, theatres or schools and universities, are being used to make people seeking persmission to stay in Britain feel welcome. Mental health and wellbeing support is also on offer, as well as social events, language classes and assistance using technology.
Wandsworth and Richmond councils in London, for instance, are offering exercise classes. Leisure activities can also be taken up in Birmingham – whose local authority declared itself effectively bankrupt in 2023 – including trampolining and theatre visits. In Cambridge, a new set of community grants is being rolled out to fund lessons for asylum seekers, including arts, cultural projects and gardening. Newcastle City Council is offering employment advice and language classes. Manchester officials work with community organisations to support migrants.
These efforts to encourage communinty assimilation come as protests take place outside hotels housing migrants across the country, GB News reports.
An Essex council has applied for an interim High Court injunction in a bid to stop asylum seekers from being housed at a local hotel.
Documents relating to the Bell Hotel in Epping were lodged with the High Court in London on Tuesday, Epping Forest District Council said in a statement.
A series of protests have been held outside the hotel in recent weeks.
Council leader Chris Whitbread said the use of the hotel as asylum accommodation risks causing “irreparable harm to the local community”.
More than 50,000 migrants have arrived in the UK after crossing the English Channel since Labour won the 2024 general election.
Home Office figures show 474 migrants arrived by small boat on Monday alone, which brings recorded arrivals to 50,271 since the election on July 4, 2024.
Labour former home secretary Baroness Smith of Malvern had said on Tuesday that reaching the milestone is “unacceptable”.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said Labour’s promise to “smash the criminal boat gangs” in its manifesto last year was “just a slogan”, with crossings now “so much worse” than they were before the vote.
There have been 27,029 arrivals so far this year, which is 47% higher than at the same point of 2024 when the figure stood at 18,342, and 67% higher than at the same time in 2023 (16,170).
