Campaigners in Linton-on-Ouse, a North Yorkshire village with a population of just over 600 adults, are furious over Labour's plan to house up to 1,250 asylum seekers at the former RAF base, warning it will turn their community into a "ghettoised mega asylum hotel". The Government has assembled a £150million war chest to "fund additional large sites to accommodate asylum seekers", with Treasury and Home Office sources confirming some of it will be used to find and convert new unannounced sites.
Community fears over safety and scale
Dozens of villagers met with Conservative MPs Chris Philp, Joy Morrissey, Kevin Hollinrake and Sir Alec Shelbrooke on Friday to warn that migrants will be wandering around outside their homes within minutes of leaving the proposed 1,250-person asylum camp. The site is next to a housing estate, complete with a toddler play area which backs onto the asylum camp, and scores of young families live nearby.
Families living next to RAF Linton-on-Ouse have vowed to move away because they don't want their children growing up next to 1,250 young, single men. Campaigners believe Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood will be breaking her own promise not to house asylum seekers near a primary school, as the site will be "nearly three times closer" to Linton-on-Ouse Primary School and Nursery than "any active site in the UK". The village's schoolchildren will have to commute past the asylum seekers every day.
Residents describe the impact
White Rose Close is just 20 steps from the camp's perimeter. Overlooking the detached three- and four-bed houses in the residential street is a giant former military accommodation block, which will almost certainly be used by the migrants. From the windows, houses and gardens are clearly visible. The street is now a mixture of families waiting to see if the plans are thwarted, people racing to leave and vacant properties.
Martin Sanderson, from the Linton-on-Ouse Action Group, told the Daily Express: "This is a mega-hotel. This is a plan to move people out of hotels into bigger ones. Now, the issue with that is when people talk about large sites, it gives the British public an idea that this will house a significant part of the accommodation challenge.
"This is going to be a huge site in respect of Linton-on-Ouse - 1,200 people in a community of 600. But in terms of the national challenge, this is minuscule."
Dean Bovington, a former military police officer who used to be part of the security team at RAF Linton-on-Ouse and now lives on Main Street, said: "I was military police for 28 years, and I settled in the village. During my time, I was in Afghanistan, on the ground doing checks on people and interacting with the locals in Afghanistan. It was hard to find out who they were and what they did and their background then.
"No passport, no sort of interaction with the country they've come from, how can we be certain they are who they say they are? Because they could make their name up."
Laura Harman, a mother-of-two with two daughters aged 7 and 9, said: "It is not the fact that they are asylum seekers; it's the fact that there are 1,200 men, that it's so disproportionate against women and children in this village to have that many men suddenly here. And they'll be bored, they don't have anything to do.
"They'll be hanging around the same spots that our kids might. I definitely would consider moving, but I will not be able to. Who would buy my house? We wouldn't be able to sell if it went ahead, so we will be living here whether we like it or not."
Political reaction and funding details
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said: "This site is not detained, so the illegal immigrants are going to be free to come and go anytime they choose, anytime of day or night. There are multiple different entries and exits from the site, right next to people's houses, right next to a child's playground, very close to a primary school.
"So, people that live there could have illegal immigrants wandering around their houses and around the playground 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It will be a migrant ghetto. 1,500 young men in one place is going to be a ghetto. It's going to be very hard to police. It's going to be a huge threat to public safety in this village. It's completely unacceptable."
Shadow Women's Minister Joy Morrissey told the Daily Express: "It's going to destroy this village. This could provide vital family accommodation, and it is going to destroy this village. People will leave, and instead of this being a vibrant place where children can go to primary school, walk along the streets, because of this migrant accommodation, all of that could be shut down. And it's not just posing a threat to women and girls, it's posing a threat to the entire community."
Andy Burnham's Government has created a £150million war chest for next year to use Wethersfield and Crowborough, East Sussex, and to develop MoD Bicester, RAF Linton-on-Ouse and RAF Barnham. Some 744 asylum seekers are living in Wethersfield, near Braintree in Essex, and 418 people are in Crowborough, according to the latest Home Office figures. Ministers want to move 1,257 migrants into MoD Bicester, near Piddington in Oxfordshire, and up to 1,200 in Linton-on-Ouse, Yorkshire. Another 930 will be housed near the village of Barnham in Suffolk.
Treasury documents state: "The Government is providing £150million capital investment in 2027-28 to fund additional large sites to accommodate asylum seekers and facilitate the Government's commitment to end the use of asylum hotels." Some 69,038 people are living in houses, flats and bedsits - including large houses in multiple occupation or HMOs - which is up from 68,719 three months ago. This includes 4,790 failed asylum seekers.
