Asylum seekers being “short-changed” by Home Office

NGOs have said that asylum seekers who have been staying in hotels across Scotland since the beginning of the pandemic are not being paid the £8 per week that they are owed by the Home Office.

Refugees have also said that some are being forced to wait months for money owed to them.

“The £8 a week is hotel subsistence. It is meant to relieve the hardship being suffered by people left in hotels for months at a time, shifted from one place to another. The Home Office conceded to the High Court that this money should be paid to allow people to pay for non prescription medicines, food and essential travel and phone calls. Yet, the home Office is not giving this money out until people are dispersed from the hotel," 

Robina Qureshi, the chief executive of Positive Action in Housing, a Scottish refugee and migrant homelessness and human rights charity, said. She went onto say:

"The full backdated amount is rarely given. It does not make sense; the Home Office appears to be flouting the High Court's guidance and ruling , and  short-changing asylum seekers. It is happening systematically. Asylum seekers are not given a written breakdown of the eventual amounts paid out. The discrepancies are well hidden. All of this only adds to the confusion about what is actually due, because there is no paper trail."

There has been a tenfold increase in the use of hotels, hostels and barracks to accommodate refugees during the pandemic. While such accommodation was meant to be temporary, many have found themselves staying in what campaigning groups call “hotel detention” for more than a year.

The Home Office’s initial decision to not pay people made it harder for them to afford basics, such as toiletries or transport to attend meetings about their asylum claim. However, in October last year, after reports of asylum seekers begging for money, the High Court ruled that they were entitled to £8 a week and asked the Home Office to backdate the payments.

Aymen al Awkhalani, who arrived in Scotland in August last year after fleeing his home in Yemen, waited two months before receiving £8 a week. “While it doesn’t help me buy what I need, some people don’t even get this,” he said. Despite being owed £64, Aymen was given only £8, which charities say is commonplace.

The Home Office apologised to Al Awkhalani and paid his backdated payments. It claimed the delay was because of an “administrative error”.