Albanians among ‘guests’ at £400-anight hotel
ALBANIAN families who reached Britain by boat are among dozens of people being housed in a luxury Lincolnshire hotel that has been taken over by the Home Office as it struggles to cope with a spiralling migrant crisis.
Stoke Rochford Hall, a grand Victorian stately home outside Grantham, usually hosts weddings that set back couples thousands of pounds, while some rooms cost more than £400 a night. When The Daily Telegraph visited this week, however, it was occupied by dozens of migrant families.
The hotel, with its picturesque grounds in countryside south of Grantham, has been hired by the Government since September, causing the cancellation of many weddings.
The Telegraph spoke to people from Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Albania, who described it as a nice place to stay but said they had little or no information about when they would be moved on or have their cases processed.
The public is banned from the hotel, which has private security guards.
It comes amid scenes of chaos across the country, with overcrowding at a key processing centre at Manston in Kent and migrants being accidentally dumped in central London without support or instructions.
The Home Office said the use of hotels was “unacceptable” and it was working hard to find alternative accommodation. A senior government source said it was alarming that migrants were being placed in luxury hotels when ministers were supposed to be deterring them from making the dangerous crossing. “We are putting asylum seekers in a stately home. How does that keep the numbers down?” they said.
Online, the hotel is shown as having no available rooms until at least the end of December. The Telegraph was unable to reach its owners, but they told a local newspaper they had a “compulsory contract” with the Government.
The Home Office declined to comment on operational matters.