Bungling Tories wasted over £15million buying a contaminated former prison to house asylum seekers after ignoring advice.
A damning report found Robert Jenrick signed off on the £15.4million purchase of the Northeye site in Bexhill-on-Sea, East Sussex, despite warnings of "significant" risk. This was more than double the £6.3million it had sold for less than a year earlier.
Home Office chiefs ignored advice and took shortcuts before Mr Jenrick, now Kemi Badenoch's Shadow Justice Secretary, decided to go ahead last March. The National Audit Office (NAO) report found it would also cost between £1.1million and £3.6million to carry out crucial work before 1,400 asylum seekers could be moved there.
The site remains empty and may have to be sold for housing. Today's report into the Northeye fiasco is the latest in a string of similar asylum failures under the Tories.
Last March the NAO found £500,000 was wasted on barges that couldn't be used. And £2.9million was spent on abandoned plans to move people to a former RAF base in Linton-on-Ouse.
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, who chairs Parliament's public accounts committee, said: “Once again, rushed and misjudged decision-making has resulted in the Home Office overpaying for an asylum accommodation site that is not fit for purpose.
"I am concerned that the Home Office deviated from standard practice, overlooked warnings about the condition of the site and lacked expertise to properly oversee the purchase of Northeye."
The NAO report found no business case was put together ahead of the purchase, which was agreed last March and finally went through in September 2023. It said the Home Office was under "significant pressure" to find sites after Rishi Sunak announced he wanted to cut hotel use and clear the asylum backlog.
The site had been sold to its previous owners in August 2022 for around £6.3million. Last year the Government was spending more than £8million a day on hotel accommodation after failing to deal with a massive asylum backlog.
A Home Office spokeswoman said: “The contents of this report relate to the previous government’s purchase of the Northeye site. Having inherited an asylum system under exceptional strain, with tens of thousands of cases stuck in a backlog, we remain committed to ending the use of hotels and housing people in more suitable and cost-effective achieving better value for the tax-payer.
“We are getting the asylum system moving again, increasing returns of people who have no right to be here, with over 9,000 people removed since July 2024. We will continue to restore order to the system so that it operates swiftly, firmly and fairly.”