A pause in asylum evictions over Christmas and during extreme cold weather is an admission Home Office policies are causing homelessness, charities say.
It comes after The Big Issue revealed evictions of newly recognised refugees from Home Office accommodation will be halted from 23 December to 2 January, with an extra three-day grace period when the severe weather emergency protocol (SWEP) is active.
Councils had been piling on pressure for the Home Office to change course, as a growing number of those made to leave asylum accommodation found themselves homeless.
“That the government has paused the seven-day-evictions due to the severe weather emergency protocol is telling and far from a cause for celebration,” Mary Atkinson, campaigns and networks manager at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, told The Big Issue. “Clearly, the Home Office recognises that they are forcing vulnerable people onto the streets.”
Matt Downie, chief executive of Crisis, said on X the news was welcome but a “tacit admission from the Home Office that evictions from asylum accommodation are causing rough sleeping”.
As the Home Office races to clear the legacy asylum backlog, it is granting vast numbers of asylum decisions. Those given a decision must leave their asylum accommodation, and are being given a minimum of seven days to find somewhere to live once they receive essential paperwork.