Question

Response

The delivery of asylum accommodation

The Home Office’s use and management of asylum accommodation contracts, including in response to growing demand and changing needs

• Glasgow has a long and proud history of welcoming refugees and those seeking asylum from all over the world. The Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 began a programme of dispersing those seeking asylum across the UK and, until 2022, Glasgow was the only dispersal area in Scotland. Glasgow recognises the significant contribution made by those granted refugee status who have added value to local communities, both culturally and economically, bringing skills, experience and a willingness to contribute to the city.
   
• The current Home Office contract with Mears Group to accommodate asylum seekers in Scotland, has progressed over a number of years with Mears currently using 4,103 bed spaces from a capacity of 6,735 available bed spaces in Glasgow. This is despite the Home Office national plan advising that Glasgow should have 1,278 bedspaces used. This demand plan has been reduced by Home Office to 993 as of 1st December 2024.

• There is an existing plan to move towards dispersal across all local authorities in Scotland, with a specific focus on rural authorities, however this is progressing very slowly and not meeting Home Office projections. Despite the move towards full dispersal announced in April 2022, 92% of all refugees in Scotland are supported in Glasgow and have been for many years.  Only 19 of the 32 local authorities in Scotland have dispersed accommodation (many accommodating very low numbers) despite the Home Office commitment to expand their property portfolio in Scotland.

• Furthermore, despite the dispersal plan, individuals and households migrate to Glasgow because of the attraction of work, acute health services and asylum communities which have been long established in the city. 

The performance of providers delivering the current contracts on:

• Identifying and delivering appropriate accommodation
• Engaging and working with stakeholders
• Safeguarding and supporting the welfare of people in asylum accommodation
• Managing and sharing data

• On an operational level, there are positive links with Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership and Mears Group.  Weekly operational meetings take place between both organisations, and partners, which discuss safeguarding issues as well as other operational challenges.

• An example of this positive engagement is the collaborative work with Glasgow and Mears Group to significantly reduce the number of households who are considered ‘overstayers’ in Home Office accommodation. At its peak, there were 260 households with over 600 individuals overstaying in Mears Group accommodation, this has since reduced to 49 households with 81 individuals as at 20/1/25 and is being managed proactively by both organisations.

• Glasgow had a positive engagement strategy with the provider over the summer of 2024 regarding protest activity. Glasgow shared best practice / local intelligence and agreed protocol with Police Scotland regarding safeguarding and welfare as well as sharing of key information.

• Despite the positive engagement operationally, there are no discussions with Glasgow regarding identifying and delivering appropriate accommodation in the city.

There are difficulties in obtaining information from Mears e.g., not sharing information on bed space data in the city on their property data set or properties that they no longer lease. Glasgow has raised concerns about verbal updates from Mears on national meetings which is not supported with robust data.

• Glasgow welcomes the new data reports, however, there is a disconnect between teams within the Home Office which impacts on the information that is provided. Information often does not align and this impacts on the city’s ability to forward plan and allocate resources accordingly.

How the Home Office works with other Government departments and local authorities on housing supply issues.

• As mentioned above, Glasgow is currently home to around 92% of asylum seekers in Scotland at a time when the local authority has declared a ‘housing emergency’. Furthermore, Glasgow is additionally challenged by the fact that it is a non-stock holding local authority and is reliant on accommodation provided by housing associations in the city to accommodate homeless households.

• Given the disproportionate number of asylum seekers in the city, Mears require a large property portfolio in Glasgow, in both the social housing and private rented sector. This, consequentially, limits the ability of the local authority to access this accommodation for homeless households. For example, Mears Group lease over 1,500 properties in the Private Rented Sector which could be used by a commissioned 3rd sector provider to accommodate homeless households.

• At present, Glasgow is currently accommodating over 1,500 homeless households in bed and breakfast/hotel accommodation which is defined as ‘unsuitable accommodation’ under legislation. The lack of access to accommodation in the city is a significant factor in the use of this type of accommodation.

• Glasgow has also witnessed individuals and families migrating to Glasgow when in Home Office accommodation elsewhere in Scotland. A snapshot of data from Mears showed 82 households moved on from Mears accommodation to settled accommodation throughout Scotland (out with Glasgow) between 1 and 31 October 2024.  30 of those 82 have since been accommodated by Glasgow. Therefore, this snapshot highlights that despite the dispersal plan, 36.6% of Service Users still migrated to Glasgow in October 2024 after receiving a positive asylum decision. It is also likely that more have requested accommodation and are in the process. Glasgow will continue to track to get more longer-term data.  It would be helpful for Mears to take a proactive role in advising individuals and households of expectations that they stay long term in Local Authorities where they have been in Home Office accommodation and where they have likely been able to integrate into the local community and access local services.

The impact of current arrangements for asylum accommodation on local areas

The Home Office’s approach to the distribution of asylum accommodation at a regional and local level.

• Glasgow declared a housing emergency in November 2023, and the number of live homelessness applications is in excess of 6,600. 41% of Glasgow’s live homelessness caseload are households who have been granted leave to remain.

• It is acknowledged that there is still a significant level of work to be undertaken across the Scottish region to implement the Home Office’s full dispersal plan for accommodation and it will be challenging to deliver this quickly. Thus far only 19 Local Authorities in Scotland have any accommodation and only 8% of asylum seekers are accommodated outside of the city of Glasgow.
• 92% all refugees in Scotland’s HO Dispersal Plan are supported in Glasgow:

4103 total dispersed population in Glasgow

4436 total dispersed population in Scotland (Scotland Full Dispersal Dec 2024).

• Glasgow is bordered by 6 neighbouring authorities in the central belt who have comparable housing stock types to Glasgow. Many of these authorities have not declared a housing emergency and are not routinely breaching homelessness legislation, yet there does not appear to be any appetite to scale up accommodation in these authorities. Given the proximity of these authorities to Glasgow, Mears could maintain a base and infrastructure in Glasgow whilst supporting households in neighbouring authorities.

• Glasgow / COSLA would welcome further dialogue on how a realistic regional distribution plan could be agreed and the timescales as to when this may be achieved. Whilst dispersal is progressing in Scotland, refugee households continue to be attracted to Glasgow because of employment, acute health services and community cohesion in the city. 

• This puts additional pressure to a local authority that already has the highest asylum and refugee population in UK. It is also worth noting that housing and homelessness legislation differs in Scotland to that in place in England/Wales. Scottish legislation does not assess for ‘priority need’ and has a universal entitlement to accommodation for all unintentionally homeless households. Therefore, many individuals who have received their positive asylum decision throughout the UK, travel to Scotland, and Glasgow in particular, to seek homeless assistance.  

The Home Office’s engagement and joint working with local authorities, local health services, NGOs and other local partners 

• Glasgow Health and Social Care Partnership has an integrated Asylum Refugee Health and Social Care Service which is necessary to meet the needs of the asylum and refugee population and has a long history of delivering successful outcomes for this group. The integrated team facilitates a coordinated approach to both health and social care recognising the health challenges associated with the asylum and refugee population who have often experienced trauma in their home countries and may have been unable to access any specialist health services previously.

• Links with the Home Office and local health services are limited, and communication sits with the local authority in Glasgow through our asylum health service. There is an opportunity to improve links to primary and acute health services. This is vital for the city to continue to provide the necessary primary and secondary health care, education and social services that are required to integrate refugee households into local communities and ensure sustainability and community cohesion. 

• Further funds are required to support this infrastructure with both local authority and third sector services struggling to meet the demands of supporting this vulnerable group.

The impact of the current approach to delivering asylum accommodation on local services.

• As mentioned above, many individuals seeking asylum have experienced significant trauma and many also have undiagnosed (and untreated) physical and mental health issues.

• Local services including health, education and housing are severely stretched and are struggling to meet the current demands from this group. This risks a breakdown in community cohesion when services are felt to be under strain and individuals feel like services are not working effectively for them.

Since December 2023 to November 2024 some of the main Health issues identified at the initial stage of the Asylum process from the integrated Asylum Refugee Health staff are as follows:

• Mental health required support: 365 people have advised of sleeping difficulty requiring GP and Nursing intervention.
• 183 individuals have advised they have been trafficked, or have been a victim of modern slavery,
• 200 individuals have been detained in their own country or a country they have travelled through,
• 299 individuals have advised they have been tortured,
• 220 have advised they have witnessed family members and others being tortured,
• 273 individuals have experience psychological trauma
• 90 people have a confirmed mental health diagnosis requiring support from the Asylum refugee mental health Nurses, community mental health teams and psychology services.
• Sexual health support: 104 males and females have advised of having sexual intercourse against their will.
• 112 individuals have experience sexual trauma, they would all require support from sexual health services.
• 64 individuals advised of mobility issues; 12 individuals identified as having learning disabilities who requiring additional support.
• From April 2024 to December 2024 there was 1,633 recorded patient attendance at the drop-in clinic within the welcome accommodation.
• From October 2024 to December 2024 service users who have leave to remain presenting in Glasgow 65 out of the 77 females have been pregnant.
• 276 males supported for health 78 have sex with other men who have been referred to sexual health services.
• 324 have reported a disability and been supported to register with a local GP from families presenting
• 41 have had children under 5 who have been referred to Health Visitor services.

The Home Office’s approach to working with local partners to support people who have been granted refugee status and are leaving asylum accommodation.

• From December 2024 until June 2025, the 28-day notice period for asylum seekers increased to 56 days which is intended to increase the length of time that those granted leave to remain have to find their own accommodation. However, the ability to find accommodation in Glasgow (a city experiencing a housing emergency) is highly improbable. Glasgow does welcome this increase as it allows the local authority more time to plan and allocate temporary accommodation however almost all asylum seekers previously in Home Office accommodation in Glasgow (of all households referred by Mears between Jan–Nov 2024, 76% made a homeless application at the time they were referred. Others who don’t apply at the outset often subsequently apply at a later date; it is difficult to capture and correlate this data. Asylum seekers are, in general, unable to work and therefore are unable to obtain the deposits needed for private rented accommodation, making homelessness (and temporary accommodation) their only option.

• There appears to be no ‘upstream’ plan for each family regarding their realistic housing options or any information provided about other local authorities, which border Glasgow, where households are more likely to achieve settled accommodation more quickly.

• In addition to pressures from those in Home Office accommodation within the city, the number of households who have travelled to Glasgow after receiving their leave to remain out with the city were in excess of 600 in 2023/24 and are projected to reach 900 in 2024/25. These are households travelling to Glasgow form other parts of the UK (most often, Belfast, London, Birmingham, and Manchester) with no advance communication or plan in place. Glasgow must manage this additional, unplanned, demand when the households present to the local authority requiring temporary accommodation.

• Furthermore, Glasgow is also experiencing an increase in family reunions (a policy of the Home Office) when often single applicants apply to reunite with their families. There is no communication with local authorities and no forward planning, yet the impact of that decision, the cost and resources sit solely with the local authority.

• There have been 65 family reunions since June 2024 (adding 173 new people to their homelessness application) and some individuals have applied to have up to 7 children join them in the city. Glasgow recognises this as positive for the family but also challenging to manage in a city which has a small number of larger family housing. Glasgow has recently lost a judicial review at the Court of Session in relation to the lack of accommodation for large family households in the city.

• It has been calculated that the true cost of providing temporary accommodation is £30,000 for a refugee leaving asylum accommodation whereas the current resource allocation is £750 leaving the local authority to fund the difference.