Edward Leigh – 2022 Question on Asylum Seekers Being Housed in Grantham

The question asked by Sir Edward Leigh, the Conservative MP for Gainsborough in the House of Commons on 7 November 2022.

This whole situation is a farce. There were recent reports that illegal migrants were being put up in a luxury rural hotel—a former stately home near Grantham—that normally charges £400 a night. Surely the easier and quicker that we make this whole process, the more people will come, especially since it is a complete pushover, with a large number of young Albanian men claiming modern slavery, which is ridiculous. Will the Minister confirm that the solution is to repeal the Human Rights Act, get out of the European refugee convention and repeal the Modern Slavery Act 2015, so that people can be detained when they arrive for being involved in an illegal activity and then deported?

Robert Jenrick

I, too, was disturbed to see images of the Stoke Rochford Hall Hotel, which is a luxurious setting and not the kind of hotel in which we want to see individuals being accommodated. We want to see decent but commonsensical treatment that does not create a further pull factor to the UK. The Home Secretary and I will review whether further changes are required. We start from the basic principle that treaties that the UK Government have entered into must work in the best interests of the British people.