Sussex Weald MP criticises plans to use Crowborough Training Camp as asylum seeker accommodation until 2030 as ‘U-turn on previous public assurances’
The MP for Sussex Weald has criticised Home Office plans to use Crowborough Training Camp as asylum seeker accommodation until 2030.
On Friday, June 19, Wealden District Council (WDC) said on its website www.wealden.gov.uk/crowborough-army-camp that it had written to the Home Office and Ministry of Defence again ‘to seek clarity on how long the camp will be used’.
The WDC update said: “The Home Office has said repeatedly that use of the site would be limited to 12 months. However official papers reveal they are seeking to extend this, including agreement from the Ministry of Defence (MOD) to an extension until 2030. The council continues to press the Home Office for clear information and will publish any response received.”
Responding to this news, MP Nusrat Ghani called it ‘a U-turn on previous public assurances’, adding that it should be ‘a wake-up call’ to Wealden District Council’s leadership. She said ‘they should have seen this coming’, adding that WDC had previously refused to support legal action being taken against the Home Office by Crowborough Shield CIC (Community Interest Company).
Crowborough Shield had its first application for judicial review refused by a High Court judge on February 27. In March, WDC said explained that its King’s Counsel team had advised against pursuing a new judicial review against the Home Office, saying it would be ‘unlikely to achieve anything of practical value’. But on April 21 Crowborough Shield chair Kim Bailey said in a Facebook video message that the Crowborough Shield CIC could proceed with a fresh application for judicial review of the Home Office’s decision to use the site for asylum accommodation.
Kim Bailey, of Crowborough Shield, said in a Facebook video on Thursday, June 25, that the news of the camp being used until 2030 was a ‘further failure of this Government’.
Ms Ghani said: “This is yet another blow for Crowborough residents, especially the Cadets and blue light services who are now being displaced from the site not for months, but for years. I will fight it all the way.”
She said: “I will continue to lead the campaign to step up and stand up for Crowborough and challenge the Home Office as they give no guarantee that they will ever willingly leave the Crowborough site.”