“Save our kids” read one sign. “Deport foreign criminals”, read another. “Make Britain Great Again” on a third, painted in baby blue. This Sunday saw the latest protests across the UK, with most attention focused on Epping in Essex. I visited to try and find out how the town had become a hotbed for tensions against asylum seekers, as police warn that the unrest is likely to continue across the country this summer.
“Epping is lovely. It’s a nice little quiet place, everyone knows each other,” says Caroline Donohue, who works in the Cancer Research UK charity shop on High Road. In the next breath, she tells me, that in this nice little place, “I’m sorry to say, but no one wants the immigrants in the hotels.” For in the past month, the news has been dominated by sometimes-violent protests outside The Bell Hotel, which has been housing asylum seekers. The protests began after an Ethiopian man who was staying there was charged with sexual assault, harassment and inciting a girl to engage in sexual activity days after arriving in the UK on a small boat. He denies the charges. Sunday July 27 saw the latest protest, at which political activist Tommy Robinson (whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) was due to attend, and had rallied his mostly Far-Right supporters to join him — before changing his mind in the days leading up to the protest. There were still an estimated 400 protestors, with up to 2,000 counter protestors facing them down.
As crowds of counter protestors gathered at Epping station on Sunday afternoon, tensions briefly flared up as a handful of independent and right-wing streamers filmed them. But other than that, the police successfully managed to keep the groups apart during the day. Three people were arrested during these protests, one linked to a previous demonstration, but no violence was reported, police said.
Why locals are feeling angry
Donohue understands why there has been such an uprising against the hotels accommodating asylum seekers. “There are people on housing lists around here waiting for somewhere and they’re getting accommodated before the locals,” she says. “So everyone starts getting a bit angry. Everyone’s just pissed off with Keir Starmer.” While Donohue is aware this issue didn’t start under this Labour government, she says Starmer’s government has “just let them all come in”. Combined with a rise in financial pressures across basic living costs, she explains that it’s “not that we mind people coming in… but it’s just too much because everyone’s standard of living is going down.”
She tells me that her wages at the charity shop cover her bills and that she has a second job to cover other living expenses, such as her car, but is frustrated at the small financial support they receive. “It’s like they’re jumping the queue. It’s just very unfair.” Donohue said she had not been to any of the demonstrations, but said she would join if she wasn’t working. She said, however, she might shut the shop a bit early, not to join, but because she was on edge that there might be trouble later in the day.
Donohue wasn’t the only one whose primary objection was “unfairness”.
Rising tensions
One shop displayed an A4 piece of paper on the door stating it was closed for the day “due to unforeseen circumstances”. Across the road from Cancer Research UK, the small businesses that were open were equally on edge about the protests that were due to take place that afternoon. Louis Turchin, 24, and Joe Williams, 32, who both work at Epping Reef and Reptiles and live nearby, said that while they haven’t been forced to close because of any of the disorder or protests in the past few days, they were aware that was a possibility on Sunday.
They explained that many of the businesses in the village stay in touch with one another via a WhatsApp group. They said if it kicked off, they would potentially shut down. “All we’re concerned about is the safety and livelihood of the high street at the end of the day,” said Williams.
As we continue to discuss the recent protests and violence, Turchin said, “I would not call Epping racist”, adding that he believed the people engaged in rioting were not from Epping. “It doesn’t help that you get extremes on either side,” said Williams. “The extremist views are not representative of the area.” Our conversation is briefly and comically interrupted by a nearby gecko trying to break free from its tank.
I would not call Epping racist
Adeeb Mohammed, 28, who works in the phone shop next door, Master Gadgets Solutions, said his shop had closed early on Thursday, and was conscious he might be forced to close early again. Since the protests, he said he has felt tension in the air. He has worked in the phone shop for the last three years, and currently lives in Romford. He later explains that he is an immigrant who was born in Hong Kong to Pakistani parents and moved to the UK around 10 years ago. I asked if he’d experienced any racism over the last few weeks in light of recent events. He said he had not, adding that the locals know him well. I asked how he felt about the situation at The Bell Hotel. While he was aware of varying circumstances in many asylum seekers’ home countries, he said “you shouldn’t come here illegally”. “Obviously, I’m an immigrant as well, but I came the legal way. I came to Heathrow airport,” he said.
Asked what he thinks the solution to the situation in Epping is, he said: “They should close it if that’s what the locals want.” Last week, Epping Forest District Council voted to urge the government to shut the asylum hotel. “The locals know best what’s happening in their area.”
It’s not a problem with refugees, it’s a problem with men
Just after 1pm, I saw people who had come to join the counter demonstration organised by Stand up to Racism gradually start to arrive, assembling in the car park next to Epping tube station. Sabby Dhalu, one of the organisers of the counter protest, said that fascist groups were simply taking advantage of the alleged attack in Epping. “They’re seizing on that in order to stir up racism and violence, and that’s very similar to what we saw with the horrific murders and attacks in Southport last year” said Dhalu, an admin worker from London.
Lil Rhodes, a 22-year-old student and tutor from Tottenham, shared Dhalu’s view. “It’s an issue of men. It’s an issue of patriarchy,” she says. “It’s not an issue [with] refugees or asylum seekers.”
Girls aren’t safe in London. I got harassed just for wearing leggings on the streets... but that’s an issue of men objectifying women, not of migrants
“Girls aren’t safe in London. They’re not safe in Epping. I got harassed last night. I was walking home from the gym. I got harassed for wearing leggings on the streets,” she adds. “But that’s not an issue of migrants. That’s an issue of men objectifying women.” For Dhalu, the solution was to put more resources into speeding up the processing of asylum applications so that those who are granted permission to stay can be quickly given the right to work and start contributing to society.
After a round of speeches at the station, the counter protest was on the move, marching along a route that steered them well away from the centre of Epping in a bid to avoid clashes. As the march left the station, protestors broke into chants, including “Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here”, “Nazi scum off our streets” and “We welcome every refugee, throw the nazis in the sea”.
A hotel surrounded
Outside The Bell Hotel, protesters demanding that it no longer house asylum seekers, stand across the road from the building, penned in by a temporary metal fence. Many carried Union Jacks and England flags. I spotted a few placards from the far right party Homeland — whose members have been found to be behind groups organising and engaging in demonstrations outside the hotel over the last week. A Reform UK flag is also visible. Police and police vans — some from forces outside of Essex — surrounded the hotel. I couldn’t see any asylum seekers in the window of the hotel.
Speaking through the fence, Julie Douglas, who has lived in neighbouring Theydon Bois for the last 15 years, said she has come to the protests for her granddaughters that live in Epping. “I want them to be able to walk the street and feel safe,” Douglas says. Asked if she has any sympathy for the asylum seekers, she says “No”.
You can’t just come here and take everything for free off the taxpayers. It’s not about race, it’s about fairness
“You can’t just come here and take everything [for] free off us taxpayers,” she says. “We live in a nice community. We pay a lot of money to live here. They come here. They don’t pay taxes.”
“They get everything free. I hear they’re getting fed regular meals,” she claims. “Some children are going to school without hot meals.”
“It’s not about race. It’s about fairness.”
Douglas, 59, who isn’t in work, believes asylum seekers come to the UK because we are a “soft touch”. She says she wants the hotel emptied, adding that she would go to other protests targeting hotels putting up asylum seekers. At the ballot box, she said she would be voting for Reform UK.
The Trump solution?
The Stand Up to Racism March arrived at about 4pm, assembling in a field across the road from the hotel. Temporary metal fences and a moat of police vans and police separated the two groups in the field as they engaged in a shouting match. With both sides focused on one another, the hotel felt irrelevant for a moment.
Reece, a 29-year-old admin worker from Thurrock, who was draped in a Union Jack and carrying a handmade placard calling for the release of Lucy Connolly, said he wanted all hotels housing asylum seekers closed down. “They should all be sent back straight away. They shouldn’t be put up in hotels while we’ve got homeless people on the streets, while we’re struggling as a country” said Reece, who declined to give his last name. He said that tough, and somewhat controversial, policies were needed to solve the situation, citing Donald Trump’s approach of sending some people to El Salvador and Australia’s policy of detaining asylum seekers offshore on an island called Nauru. He said he had attended one of the protests outside the hotel last week.
Reece, however, then made a surprising comment.
“Funnily enough, I’ve been to protests before with Stand up to Racism,” he said, explaining it was a demonstration against the bombing of Syria a few years back.
“I understand their views, and we do agree on most things,” he says. “But the issue of ‘Should we let unvetted people come into our country?’, I feel like that’s the big division between us.”
Donning a baby blue ‘Make Britain Great Again’ hat, wearing a Trump 2024 T-shirt and carrying a large Union Jack, Sarah Buchanan’s politics are arguably much more clear cut. “I’m very patriotic. I love this country, and I just don’t like what is going on,” says Buchanan, 55, who lives in Cheshunt and who works for a commercial lighting company. “We’ve got an immigrant hotel in Cheshunt,” she said. “We’ve just started a petition on Friday that’s got over 2000 signatures to close that one down. We haven’t had any protests there yet, but I think it’ll be coming.” The petition was started by Reform UK Broxbourne, a town just north of Cheshunt. Buchanan later explains she is a fan of both Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson.
“Arriving in droves, unvetted, illegally”
I put to her the view of many of the counter demonstrators; that white British men have also sexually assaulted women or abused children and that this isn’t a problem that is unique to asylum seekers.
“We know it’s not just them,” she replies, referring to the asylum seekers. “But there is a lot of crime and sexual assaults being committed by these people, and they are coming into our country in droves, unvetted, illegally.”
Buchanan, who has attended previous demonstrations against the hotel in Epping, said she believed asylum seekers come here because they can get a lot of support for free. “And they’re jumping ahead of the British people on housing lists,” she said. She said her 52-year-old brother has struggled to get social housing, and has had to move in with their mum. She is aware however that, for her, closing down the hotel won’t resolve the matter. “They’re just going to go to another area, and that’s not what we want. We don’t want them just to be moved around, causing trouble and whatever in other areas. We just need to stop them coming in, and they just need to all be deported.”
Despite being billed as a potential bust-up between far right and far left, the day ultimately passed without any major brawls or violence. The disruption that many small businesses in Epping were braced for earlier in the day, never materialised. One police liaison officer said that’s often how it is. Only three arrests were made on Sunday, one of which was in connection to an earlier protest. What will the summer bring? While tension in Epping ebbed and flowed, a separate protest was underway outside the Britannia International Hotel in Canary Wharf - which was the scene of several protests and counter-protests earlier this week after rumours swirled asylum seekers were to be housed there.
The weekend also saw protests against migrant hotels escalated this weekend with tense stand–offs in Norwich, Portsmouth, Bournemouth and Leeds. It is clear that campaigns and protests to shut them down, and the counter protests that follow them, are unlikely to stop any time soon. Whether or not the summer will erupt into riots which many expect, only time will tell.
