Asylum hotels will be in use for years, borders watchdog warns – leaving Reeves’ pledge in tatters
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Border watchdog says Reeves’ pledge to scrap asylum hotels will fail
- UK borders watchdog David Bolt warned that Rachel Reeves' pledge to end the use of asylum hotels by 2029 will likely fail.
- Bolt attributed this anticipated failure to a critical lack of sufficient housing stock to accommodate the large number of people in the asylum system.
- He also expressed skepticism about the government's ability to "smash the gangs" involved in channel crossings, noting the low risk and high profitability of organised immigration crime.
- Bolt suggested the challenge was changing the risk-reward ratio for perpetrators and addressing factors like illegal working that attract people to the UK.
- The warning comes as channel crossings have reached a record high for this point in the year, with over 18,000 arrivals so far in 2025.