Resource

A first-of-its-kind clinical study by the Helen Bamber Foundation and the University of Hertfordshire looked at the mental health impact of living in hotel accommodation on people seeking protection in the UK. It found that those forced to live in asylum hotels experience significantly higher levels of distress and depression compared to people living in alternative accommodation.

Despite mounting evidence of the profound harm it causes, the Home Office continues its practice of wrongly assessing children who come to the UK alone to seek protection, as adults. For the third year in a row, the Helen Bamber Foundation’s data shows that hundreds of child refugees are continuing to be incorrectly treated as adults after a visual assessment of age at the border and placed with strangers in adult accommodation and even adult prisons.

18 months ago, the Helen Bamber Foundation (HBF) published detailed evidence from medical assessments and casework showing that the government’s use of Wethersfield airbase as a large ‘open-prison camp’ for men seeking asylum since July 2023 was causing profound harm. New data shows that this is still the case and yet, despite the Prime Minister's commitment to close it, the site remains open.