The first group of 27 asylum seekers has arrived at a former military camp in Crowborough, East Sussex, which will eventually house over 500 people. The move is part of the UK's plan to move people out of costly hotels into large-scale accommodation.
The first group of asylum seekers has been moved into a former military training camp near Crowborough in East Sussex, the UK's Home Office has announced.
Twenty-seven men arrived at the site in the early hours of Thursday (January 22), with the facility expected to be expanded over the coming months to accommodate more than 500 male asylum seekers, local British media has reported.
The site was previously used to house Afghan families following the evacuation from Kabul in 2021. Ministers say the move forms part of a wider effort to reduce reliance on costly hotels for asylum accommodation.
"Crowborough is just the start…I will bring forward site after site until every asylum hotel is closed and returned to local communities," Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has stated.
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Military site monitored 24/7 with CCTV
According to the Home Office, more than 400 hotels were opened under the previous government at a cost of nine million pounds (10 million euros) a day. Just under 200 hotels remain in use, with overall asylum costs down 15 percent, a spokesperson said.
"We will get out of every asylum hotel in this country, and military sites are part of that solution," the home secrtary said, adding she would defend "vigorously" any legal challenges to the policy.
The Home Office said the site has "robust safety and public-protection safeguards," including specialist security, 24/7 CCTV, and screening of asylum seekers against policing, criminality and immigration databases before arrival, Britain's state broadcaster, the BBC reported.
Local MP says military site not confirmed to be safe and legal
Plans to use the site, first announced last year, have prompted regular protests in Crowborough. The BBC cited Wealden District Council leader James Partridge as saying that housing asylum seekers at the camp was the wrong decision, but urged residents to come together "in the way we did when the Afghan families and Ukrainian refugees arrived."
Deputy council leader Rachel Millward said the Home Office had not engaged adequately with the community. "That means the alarm, fear and possibility of misinformation has just gone up and up," she told BBC Radio Sussex.
Crowborough Shield, a residents' group is urging the council to use its statutory powers to halt further arrivals.
Kim Bailey, who chairs Crowborough Shield, said housing asylum seekers in camps costs a "hell of a lot more" than hotels and could increase the impact on communities because of "greater numbers."
Local MP Nusrat Ghani, part of the opposition Conservative party, said the Home Office had failed to show the site was "safe, legal and compliant," calling the lack of transparency "shameful." However, during the 14 years her party held office, prior to July 2024, they also were in the process of trying to open up former military sites to house large groups of asylum seekers, migrants and refugees, as an alternative to hotel accommodation.
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