An Essex council has demanded the “immediate and permanent closure” of two asylum hotels after a “number of serious incidents” in the town.
Epping Forest District Council met on Thursday night to discuss a motion by leader Chris Whitbread that said: “Repeated warnings to the Home Office about the unsuitability of both sites have gone unheeded”.
He added that there have been several incidents linked to people staying at the Bell Hotel in Epping and the Phoenix Hotel in Bobbingworth in recent weeks, including the arrest and charge of a man for the alleged sexual assault of a schoolgirl and the arrest of another for a reported arson.
Councillors voted unanimously to urge the Government to close the hotels as they expressed “grave concern that there is no transparency over who is being housed in [them], or what risk they may pose to the community”.
The local authority alleged that “the Government’s actions are reckless and have potentially endangered public safety”.
The Home Office should “cease the use of unsuitable hotels in small towns and rural areas for asylum processing”, the motion read.
Roger Hirst, the Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner (PFCC) for Essex, joined the calls for the closures.
He said he had written to Yvette Cooper, outlining the “unsustainability” of the locations for housing migrants.
“I have today written to the Home Secretary, requesting a meeting to discuss the ongoing use of hotels in the Epping Forest District of Essex, and elsewhere in the county, to accommodate newly arrived asylum seekers,” he said.
“Specifically, I am seeking to highlight the unsuitability of The Bell Hotel in Epping for this purpose, and request that its use be reviewed.
“The presence of asylum seeker accommodation in this district is clearly creating community tension. These large-scale protests are disrupting local life and placing an unwelcome burden on Essex Police resources.”
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “We inherited a broken asylum and immigration system, and that's why we've been taking action step by step, including 6,000 fewer asylum seekers in hotels in the last six months, and a 28% increase in returns of failed asylum seekers since the election, but it takes time to tackle that broken system.”
It follows anti-migrant protests outside the Bell Hotel. Earlier on Thursday, local police issued a dispersal order in the area and the council’s offices closed early amid concerns of further riots.
The force later confirmed one person was taken into custody for wearing a face covering at the hotel during an otherwise peaceful protest. In total 17 people have now been arrested.
Demonstrations were sparked by the arrest and subsequent charge of an Ethiopian asylum seeker who had recently arrived on a small boat and is accused of a sexual assault against a teenage girl. He denied the charge in court last week.
Neo-Nazi groups have been accused of stoking tensions in the area. Members of the far-right group Homeland are administrators of the Facebook page “Epping Says No”, where demonstrations have been organised.
The Homeland Party was formed as a splinter group to the neo-Nazi Patriotic Alternative in April 2023. Hope Not Hate has described it as the largest fascist group in the UK.
Dozens of anti-immigration protesters also congregated outside the Britannia hotel in Canary Wharf this week after false reports that asylum seekers were being moved from Epping there at a cost of £400 per person, per night.
The Home Office confirmed the east London hotel had been earmarked to house migrants at a cost of £81 per person a night but people would not be moved from Epping.
Counter-protesters from Stand Up to Racism attended demonstrations in both Essex and Canary Wharf.
Tensions are being “exacerbated by the historical presence of far-right groups in the area, such as the Homeland Party and formerly elected British National Party councillors”, Mr Whitbread said.
The head of the Police Federation, Tiff Lynch, has warned that the disorder in Essex is a “signal flare” for more unrest to come.
She said officers were likely to be taken away from neighbourhood duties amid fears they will have to keep the peace at protests over migrants this summer.
Police chiefs will be “forced to choose between keeping the peace at home or plugging national gaps”, she said, adding that “little has improved” since riots last July sparked by the murder of three girls in Southport.
