EPPING: Britain’s government was considering Wednesday whether to appeal a court ruling blocking the housing of asylum seekers in a flashpoint hotel, as it scrambled to come up with contingency plans for the migrants.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour administration braced itself for further legal challenges from local authorities following Tuesday’s judge-issued junction that has dealt it a major political and logistical headache.
Anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage indicated that councils run by his hard-right Reform UK party, leading in national polls, would pursue similar claims as he called for protests outside migrant hotels.
Security minister Dan Jarvis said the government was weighing challenging high court judge Stephen Eyre’s granting of a temporary injunction to stop migrants from staying at the Bell Hotel in Epping, northeast of London.
The local authority sought the ruling following several weeks of protests outside the hotel, some of which have turned violent. The demonstrations erupted after a resident was charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl.
“We’re looking very closely at it,” Jarvis told Sky News of a possible appeal.
The interior ministry had tried to have the case dismissed, warning it would “substantially impact” its ability to provide accommodation for tens of thousands of asylum seekers across Britain.
“We’re looking at a range of different contingency options,” Jarvis told Times Radio, adding: “We’ll look closely at what we’re able to do.”
Several Reform-led councils, including in Staffordshire and Northamptonshire in the Midlands area of England, announced on Wednesday that they were exploring their options following the court ruling.
Protests, some of them violent, broke out in Epping in mid-July after Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, 41, was charged. He denies the allegation and is due to stand trial later this year.
Hundreds of people have since taken part in demonstrations and counter-demonstrations outside the Bell Hotel. Further anti-immigration demonstrations also spread to London and around England.
Several men appeared in court on Monday charged with violent disorder over the Bell Hotel protests.
Epping Forest District Council argued the hotel had become a risk to public safety and that it had breached planning laws as it was no longer operating as a hotel in the traditional sense.
The judge gave authorities until September 12 to remove the migrants.
Writing in the right-wing Daily Telegraph newspaper, Farage said the “good people of Epping must inspire similar protests around Britain.”
He said peaceful demonstrations can “put pressure on local councils to go to court to try and get the illegal immigrants out.”
In Epping, an attractive market town connected to London by the underground, residents appeared to broadly welcome the imminent removal of the asylum seekers.
“It has made people feel unsettled, especially with schools being down there,” 52-year-old Mark Humphries, who works in retail, told AFP on the high street.
Carol Jones, 64, said she was relieved at the decision but wondered whether it would ever be implemented.
“They shouldn’t have been there in the first place, but where are they going to go?” the retiree told AFP.
Labour has pledged to end the use of hotels for asylum seekers before the next election, likely in 2029, in a bid to save billions of pounds.
The latest government data showed there were 32,345 asylum seekers being housed temporarily in UK hotels at the end of March, down 15 percent from the end of December.
Numbers hit a peak at the end of September 2023 when there were 56,042 asylum seekers in hotels, and the center-right Conservatives were in power.
Starmer is facing huge political pressure domestically for failing to stop irregular migrants crossing the Channel to England on small boats.
More than 50,000 people have made the dangerous crossing from northern France since Starmer became UK leader last July.
Under a 1999 law, the interior ministry “is required to provide accommodation and subsistence support to all destitute asylum seekers whilst their asylum claims are being decided.”
Enver Solomon, chief executive of Refugee Council, urged the government to “partner with local councils to provide safe, cost-effective accommodation within communities” rather than use hotels.
“Ultimately, the only way to end hotel use for good is to resolve asylum applications quickly and accurately so people can either rebuild their lives here or return home with dignity,” he said Tuesday.
UK set for more legal challenges over migrant hotels
https://arab.news/n6w2r
UK set for more legal challenges over migrant hotels
- The local authority sought the ruling following several weeks of protests outside the hotel, some of which have turned violent
- The demonstrations erupted after a resident was charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl
Hong Kong election turnout in focus amid anger over deadly fire
- Security tight as city holds legislative elections
- Residents angry over blaze that killed at least 159
HONG KONG: Hong Kong’s citizens were voting on Sunday in an election where the focus is on turnout, with residents grieving and traumatized after the city’s worst fire in nearly 80 years and the authorities scrambling to avoid a broader public backlash.
Security was tight in the northern district of Tai Po, close to the border with mainland China, where the fire engulfed seven towers. The city is holding elections for the Legislative Council, in which only candidates vetted as “patriots” by the China-backed Hong Kong government may run.
Residents are angry over the blaze that killed at least 159 people and took nearly two days to extinguish after it broke out on November 26. The authorities say substandard building materials used in renovating a high-rise housing estate were responsible for fueling the fire.
Eager to contain the public dismay, authorities have launched criminal and corruption investigations into the blaze, and roughly 100 police patrolled the area around Wang Fuk Court, the site of the fire, early on Sunday.
A resident in his late 70s named Cheng, who lives near the charred buildings, said he would not vote.
“I’m very upset by the great fire,” he said during a morning walk. “This is a result of a flawed government ... There is not a healthy system now and I won’t vote to support those pro-establishment politicians who failed us.”
Cheng declined to give his full name, saying he feared authorities would target those who criticize the government.
At a memorial site near the burned-out residential development, a sign said authorities plan to clear the area after the election concludes close to midnight, suggesting government anxiety over public anger.
Beijing’s national security office in Hong Kong has said it would crack down on any “anti-China” protest in the wake of the fire and warned against using the disaster to “disrupt Hong Kong.”
China’s national security office in Hong Kong warned senior editors with a number of foreign media outlets at a meeting in the city on Saturday not to spread “false information” or “smear” government efforts to deal with the fire.
The blaze is a major test of Beijing’s grip on the former British colony, which it has transformed under a national security law after mass pro-democracy protests in 2019.
An election overhaul in 2021 also mandated that only pro-Beijing “patriots” could run for the global financial hub’s 90-seat legislature and, analysts say, further reduced the space for meaningful democratic participation.
Publicly inciting a vote boycott was criminalized as part of the sweeping changes that effectively squeezed out pro-democracy voices in Hong Kong. Pro-democracy voters, who traditionally made up about 60 percent of Hong Kong’s electorate, have since shunned elections.
The number of registered voters for Sunday’s polls — 4.13 million — has dropped for the fourth consecutive year since 2021, when a peak of 4.47 million people were registered.
Seven people had been arrested as of Thursday for inciting others not to vote, the city’s anti-corruption body said.
Hong Kong and Chinese officials have stepped up calls for people to vote.
“We absolutely need all voters to come out and vote today, because every vote represents our push for reform, our protection of the victims of disaster, and a representation of our will to unite and move forward together,” Hong Kong leader John Lee said after casting his vote.
Hong Kong’s national security office urged residents on Thursday to “actively participate in voting,” saying it was critical in supporting reconstruction efforts by the government after the fire.
“Every voter is a stakeholder in the homeland of Hong Kong,” the office said in a statement. “If you truly love Hong Kong, you will vote sincerely.”
The last Legislative Council elections in 2021 recorded the lowest voter turnout — 30.2 percent — since Britain returned Hong Kong to Chinese rule in 1997.
