Refugee Action report calls asylum seeker accommodation ‘racialised segregation and de facto detention’
Asylum seekers who complain about poor conditions in Home Office hotels have been threatened with being sent to Rwanda, according to a new report.
The report from the charity Refugee Action, entitled ‘Hostile Accommodation: how the asylum system is cruel by design’, is based on 100 in-depth interviews with asylum seekers in hotels in London, Manchester, West Midlands and Bradford.
More than half complain of overcrowding, a lack of privacy and having to spend more than six months living in a hotel. Some single adults have spent more than two and a half years in hotels.
Three-quarters have reported low quality or inappropriate food and say they are facing hunger or malnutrition. A similar number are facing mental health problems.
Majority of asylum seekers the charity is supporting are people of colour.
Numerous cases of mothers unable to continue breastfeeding because they have become malnourished due to hotel food. Some children have lost weight.
A third of families say their children have been unable to access education.
