Labour ‘wasting’ £170m in taxpayer cash reopening old asylum centres | Politics | News

Labour have been  accused of pouring public money into reopening two disused immigration centres for a shocking cost to the taxpayer of £170 million.

Sir Keir Starmer‘s Government is understood to be planning to refurbish the run-down sites of Campsfield, in Oxfordshire, and Haslar, in Hampshire, which had both been due to open last July.

It comes after the Home Office was slammed last week for “wasting” £15 million buying a derelict prison contaminated with asbestos amid political pressure to stop housing migrants in hotels.

The National Audit Office (NAO) said the Home Office cut corners and paid more than it needed to in its haste to acquire the Northeye site in Bexhill-on-Sea, East Sussex, which was “ultimately deemed unfit for its intended purpose due to contamination”.

The chairman of a Commons committee that scrutinises government spending criticised the Home Office for “rushed and misjudged” decision-making, which resulted in “overpaying” for a site that was “not fit for purpose” and said MPs would make sure taxpayers’ cash was not “wasted in future acquisitions”.

But now the i newspaper reports new Government contracts show that £101.5m is due to be spent on Haslar and a further £70m is due to be spent on Campsfield.

The potential huge spending splurge has angered Calum Miller, Liberal Democrat MP Bicester and Woodstock, who said Campsfield, in Kidlington, should not be reopened. The MP cited the centre had been closed in 2018 following a record of hunger strikes, self-harm and a suicide.

He added: “The Government hasn’t shown new places are permanently needed and the revelations around Northeye suggest it won’t spend the money well.”

Lastest Home Office figures show nearly 700 migrants arrived in small boats crossing the Channel in the last seven days.

James Wilson, director of charity Detention Action, told the i newspaper: “Official inspections repeatedly reveal that the UK’s immigration detention centres have fundamental failings that deny thousands of people their rights and do serious damage to their health.

“Meanwhile, the cost of detention, per person per day, has risen by 31 per cent since 2017, though more than 50 per cent of people detained are later released.

“So it is baffling that the Government would pour more public money into detention and ignore community-based alternatives that are fairer and more cost-effective.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Overall returns since this Government came to office are now 9,400, up almost 6,000 since the end of August.

“Owing to this faster pace of removals, we are increasing detention spaces to support the higher pace of removals, including reopening and adding an initial 290 beds at the immigration removal centres at Campsfield and Haslar.”