Prime Minister on Crowborough Army Camp: asylum process ‘working as it should work’ is key to tackling accommodation issue, says Sir Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister voiced his views on tackling ‘unlawful migration’ when he was asked about Crowborough Army Camp during a recent visit to Sussex.
Sir Keir Starmer was at Acorn Nursery in The Rise, Portslade, on Tuesday, May 26, to meet parents and children as the government outlined new action to crack down on additional charges linked to funded childcare places.
He also answered questions on other subjects.
Reporter Sam Morton, who attended the visit and wrote the main news report at www.sussexexpress.co.uk, asked: “You recently celebrated the reduction in legal migration to Britain, but concerns remain about illegal migration and asylum housing, including 500 migrants housed in a former barracks in Crowborough. Do you understand those concerns?”
The Prime Minister answered: “Let me take it in two stages. Firstly, the legal migration numbers have come right down. So under the last government, they skyrocketed up to nearly a million. It quadrupled in just a short number of years.
“We've got that under control, brought the number right down. It's now less than a fifth of the number that it was. So that is good work on that front.
“On the question of unlawful migration, of course, we need to keep cracking down on it, doing the work to stop people crossing the channel. Nobody should be crossing the channel in a small boat.
“We’re working with the French authorities and others to reduce those numbers and to bear down on it. In relation to the asylum accommodation, the important thing is that those cases are processed.
“I’m really pleased that more cases are being processed and more quickly than before, because the answer to this shouldn't be where are they housed. The answer should be to reduce those lists so we don't have to house them anywhere because the asylum process is working as it should work. And that's where we're bearing down in relation to that.”
Crowborough Army Camp is currently being used to house up to 500 single adult male asylum seekers. The Home Office announced on January 22 that the first asylum seekers had been moved in, saying the plan is part of the government’s mission to stop housing asylum seekers in ‘expensive hotels’.
Wealden District Council is providing updates about the army camp at www.wealden.gov.uk/crowborough-army-camp.