POLL: Should migrant hotels be shut?

Protests have erupted outside asylum seeker hotels up and down the country in recent weeks. The National Audit Office (NAO) estimated that housing asylum seekers will cost Britain a staggering £15.3 billion over the next decade - triple what the Home Office predicted. This year alone, the Government spent £1.3 billion housing asylum seekers in hotels, the NAO added, equivalent to 76% of all accommodation costs.

There are roughly 32,000 asylum seekers in hotels in the UK, according to Home Office figures. However, Rachel Reeves has promised to end the use of asylum seeker hotels by 2029, saving £1 billion a year. In June, the Chancellor promised £200m to "cut the asylum backlog, hear more appeal cases and return people who have no right to be here". Reducing the number of small boat crossings and building new accommodation will reduce the need for hotels, ministers said.

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This comes amid the ongoing battle to stop asylum seekers being housed in the Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex.

A hearing for Epping Forest District Council's bid to be granted a temporary injunction began on Friday at the Royal Courts of Justice in London.

The council said it filed documents at the High Court on Tuesday following a series of protests in recent weeks outside the hotel, after an asylum seeker was charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl.

Philip Coppel KC, for Epping Forest District Council, said: "Epping Forest District Council comes to this court seeking an injunction because it has a very serious problem.

"It is a problem that is getting out of hand; it is a problem that is causing a great anxiety to those living in the district. The problem has arisen because of a breach of planning control by the defendant. The defendant owns what is called the Bell Hotel."

Elsewhere in the country, locals have said their pretty village has turned into a "no-go zone" after a migrant hotel opened up nearby.

The Ibis hotel in the leafy Northamptonshire village of Crick has been operating as an asylum centre since last November.

Some locals are too scared to let their children out after dark after a woman was attacked in nearby Rugby, Warwickshire, last week.

Asylum seeker Ahmed Muhammad Almahi, 32, has been charged with sexual assault and is due to appear at Warwick Crown Court next month.

One village resident commented: "I don't want them here - they have come here illegally but are treated as guests. We have a really big problem in Crick. It feels like the whole place is overrun with them."