Dan Jarvis – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Dan Jarvis on 2016-01-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when (a) her Department and (b) the contractor G4S became aware of concerns that asylum seekers were being housed in properties with doors that are all uniform or nearly uniform in colour.

James Brokenshire

Home Office officials are working closely with our housing providers to ensure that asylum seeker accommodation is not easily identifiable. I am not aware of a uniform door colour being the practice in any other region. My officials have also spoken to our housing providers to tell them that such a practice is not acceptable.

I was first made aware of this issue when The Times contacted the Home Office in mid-January. G4S has investigated correspondence and discussions on the issue of external door colour in the North East and has confirmed that it was raised in 2012 by a Middlesbrough local councillor and was considered by the G4S audit and assurance team, no complaints from asylum seekers relating to this matter were found and a response was issued.

As I said to the House on 20 January, I instructed officials to look into this issue as a matter of urgency and I expect that the audit will be concluded on the Home Office side very shortly.