Locals were ‘kept in the dark’ over plans to open viral asylum seeker hotel despite councillors being given three weeks’ notice by the Home Office_Nhy
A Labour council was given almost three weeks’ notice of controversial plans to accommodate almost 300 asylum seekers at a town centre hotel, it has been revealed.
More than 6,000 people have signed a petition saying the Cresta Court Hotel in Altrincham, Greater Manchester is unsuitable for housing migrants.
Their overnight arrival at the end of October without any official announcement has divided the prosperous town amid accusations locals were ‘kept in the dark’.
Claims that the men would be given private healthcare – later debunked – provoked uproar.
Now it has emerged that the local authority – Labour-run Trafford council – was informed by the Home Office and contractors Serco on October 8 that they were ‘considering’ using the Cresta Court as ‘temporary’ migrant accommodation.
In a statement to a council meeting last night, its leader, Tom Ross, said his officials responded with ‘serious concerns regarding the location and the potential pressures on local services it could create’.
He said they were ‘assured that should the Home Office be minded to proceed, there would be a meeting arranged with the council’.
However with ‘no further dialogue or information’, they were ‘deeply concerned on October 25 to receive less than three days’ notice’ that the hotel was being converted to asylum accommodation.
Around 300 asylum seekers are being housed at the Cresta Court Hotel in Altrincham, near Manchester
The presence of the migrants at the Altrincham hotel has left the town divided
Migrants were spotted at the hotel earlier this month – understood to be from Syria, Yemen, Iran and Somalia
Since then, Mr Ross said the council had been ‘working with the police, the NHS, the home office, Serco and community representatives seeking to ensure the smooth running of the operation and to minimize the impact on the community’.
In response to the revelation that the local council knew about the plan three weeks in advance, local Tory councillors accused its leadership of having been ‘at best asleep at the wheel’.
‘The fact the council knew almost three weeks before they told anyone raises even more questions,’ Nathan Evans, Conservative group leader at Trafford Council, told MailOnline.
‘Did they spend that time carrying speaking to local schools and businesses in order to produce a risk assessment that could have been used to push back against the Home Office?
‘People living here need to be told the truth.’
Mr Evans is today handing the Home Office a petition signed by 6,500 people asking for the migrants to be housed elsewhere.
It warns about the impact on Altrincham’s economy and tourism sector of having a major hotel closed to paying customers.
There was shock at the end of October when local businesses were informed the Cresta Court – a fixture of the town’s hospitality scene since the 1970s and previously part of the Best Western franchise – was shutting its doors.
Altrincham residents voice worries over the Cresta Court Hotel at a protest meeting
The news caused outrage in the town as parties, weddings and functions have all been cancelled. Pictured: Migrants outside the hotel
But some residents gathered to show their support for migrants and refugees outside the venue despite the migrants being housed with no notice
There was shock at the end of October when local businesses were informed the Cresta Court was shutting its doors
Councillors were informed on October 26 via encrypted message that it was being turned into asylum accommodation, with migrants – many of whom had only crossed the Channel on small boats days earlier – bussed in on October 31.
As word spread, a public meeting was held on November 4 at which 175 worried residents expressed concerns about whether the new arrivals had undergone background checks, pointing out that the hotel was close to several schools.
Locals also asked about the impact on ‘stretched’ health services just three months after the permanent closure of the minor injuries unit at Altrincham Hospital was announced.
Addressing residents in footage that was widely shared online, Mr Evans said it was his ‘understanding’ that a private ‘doctors’ system’ had been given a contract to provide healthcare for the asylum seekers.
Mail Online later revealed that health cover for the migrants at the Cresta Court – owned by a group led by former BBC Director General Greg Dyke – will in fact be provided by not-for-profit GTD Healthcare.
GTD stressed that it provides only NHS-commissioned services and not private services.
Asylum seekers are entitled to free NHS care while claims are assessed.
The conversion of the Cresta Court comes in spite of Labour’s manifesto pledge to end the use of hotels, barges and military sites as accommodation for asylum seekers.
The hotel is part of Vine Hotels, which Greg Dyke (pictured) – a former FA chairman and BBC director-general from 2000-2004 – chairs as well as being a major shareholder
Two migrants are spotted chatting outside the Cresta Court hotel and taking selfies
More than 6,000 people have signed a petition saying the Cresta Court Hotel in Altrincham, Greater Manchester is unsuitable for housing migrants
Very similar concerns to those expressed in Altrincham are being voiced 180 miles south in the similarly genteel Datchet, in Berkshire a village in the shadow of Windsor Castle.
Here, some residents are threatening to sell up and leave, after the local 200-bed hotel was turned into a holding centre for asylum seekers.
Sources said Home Office officials gave Trafford Council a ‘heads up’ about the asylum hotel plan on October 8 ‘to allow them to raise any concerns’.
A Home Office spokeswoman said: ‘This Government inherited an asylum system under unprecedented strain, with thousands stuck in a backlog without their claims processed.
‘We are committed to working with local stakeholders and conduct mandatory identity and security checks on all small boat arrivals to ensure public safety is maintained.’
Trafford Council declined to say whether the authority’s Labour leadership was informed about the approach from the Home Office on October 8.
