EXCLUSIVE: A west London town has become the frontline of Britain’s immigration battle, housing one in ten hotel asylum seekers as locals say community is torn apart.
Many in the town said they feel they are paying the price for the government’s plans (Image: Humphrey Nemar/Express)
Walk down Uxbridge High Street and on the surface, it appears like any other. But scratch beneath and you’ll find a town struggling at the centre of the UK’s migrant crisis.
The west London town, which rests in the shadow of Heathrow Airport, has become the frontline of Britain’s immigration battle, and many here feel they are paying the price for decisions made in Whitehall.
Hillingdon borough, which includes Uxbridge and Heathrow, now houses around one in every ten hotel-housed asylum seekers in the country. It’s a situation that has caused an unbearable financial burden to be shouldered by the local authority, which is now splashing out more than £10million a year on paying for asylum seeker accommodation.
Local councillors say the Home Office is short changing them, and forcing residents to shoulder the costs. For a town already struggling with squeezed services, many residents told the Express the issue is tearing the community apart.
Susan Weston, 66, said there was a “growing concern that all these people coming over are actually, homeless, paperless […] but they are all of warmongering age.”
She warned the situation would “cause this country an awful lot of problems” and said she did not believe “any government can do anything to stop the tide that is happening.” Taking aim at Sir Keir Starmer, she said: “What is [he] doing as Prime Minister, has he got any idea? I don’t think he has.”
Ms Weston claimed Sir Keir was being “pushed by the Muslim population”, alleging it was “obvious, otherwise why would all these fighting men, muslims, be coming over to this country? Well, they’re votes for Labour.”
Susan Weston shared her views with the Express (Image: Humphrey Nemar/Express)
‘No money for local services’
“There’s no money for local services,” said Mrs Kelly, 63, who has been a council tenant all her life and lived in the area for thirty years.
When the Express met her, she was having a coffee with a friend while on hold to the local housing team. She had already been waiting twenty-five minutes, and by the time the conversation ended, the call had stretched to forty.
“I’d stop it all, other services are suffering, there are too many people in this country. The last four years it’s got much worse, too many people and not enough money,” she said. “People who live and work here, regardless of their skin colour, are not getting what they deserve.”
She fears she will never be able to retire comfortably. “I don’t think [migrants] should be allowed to come here, and get everything, when we get nothing. Personally, I don’t even know if I’ll be able to afford to retire. I am on minimum wage, I don’t have a private pension, the state pension is all I have. I was bought up that you pay for what you get. This country is finished. I don’t care who’s running it. There are too many wokes in the country.”
On almost every corner, similar grievances spill out.
One woman, who has lived in the area for 25 years and did not want to be named, said: “I am really concerned about the safety of women and children, school children with unknown illegal migrants roaming around our streets. There has been an increase in homelessness, in people sleeping on the streets. The home office must take on the cost for housing these illegal migrants. I’ve nothing against legals, but this lot are playing the system. Soon, the bottom is going to fall out. There is a very strong feeling around here that it’s wrong.”
Others say it is not just about migration itself, but where the burden has fallen. John Smith, 75, said: “It’s terrible. I’ve no objection to them being here, if they have the right to come here. But the cost should be shared across the country, not just paid by one borough.”
Uxbridge now houses around one in every ten hotel-housed asylum seekers (Image: Humphrey Nemar)
For pensioners like him and his friend, the argument is simple. “Pensions are getting a raw deal,” said Colin Easthope, 73, who has lived in the area for 28 years. “Instead we are giving away money overseas, and not looking after our own in this country. Labour are a ‘no-no’ from me. I’ve always felt like you get a better deal with the Tories, since Labour took over the cost of everything has gone up.”
Some comments are blunter, and show how bitter the mood has become.
“It’s a struggle to hear English on the high street. It takes a week to get an appointment. It’s changed in the three years I’ve lived here,” said one man who did not give his name.
Another resident, 73-year-old Michelle Clack, said: “The people here are wicked, especially the foreigners. My son doesn’t have a property as the council won’t give him one. Nothing against them [migrants] but they need to show respect.”
One of the flashpoints that epitomised local division occurred early this year when a local man chased a group of youngsters into a shopping center after they “ran into him” and “pushed him” before shouting “English B*stard”.
Behind the anger however sit hard numbers that support a growing sense of unfairness. The council has a legal duty to house people who “present as homeless” after arriving at Heathrow. Local leaders say that responsibility has morphed into an open-ended bill for support and long-term housing that the area can no longer absorb.
Cllr Steve Tuckwell, Hillingdon Council’s Cabinet Member for Planning, Housing and Growth, said: “Inadequate funding for our asylum and immigration responsibilities by the government is placing an unfair financial burden on residents, who are having to subsidise these additional costs as a result of increasing evictions from Home Office accommodation with the expectation that the council will provide support.
“Soaring demand for services and significant underfunding by government for several years is creating unsustainable financial pressures for the council, and these have been further intensified by increasing demands to support former asylum seekers, as well as Chagossians arriving via Heathrow Airport.
“While we’re proud of upholding our lawful requirements in providing safe sanctuary, the government needs to understand the scale and unique challenges facing Hillingdon. We’re paying £5million annually to support former asylum seekers, and there is an expected added annual cost to the council of £2million to support Chagossians. It’s not just the financial cost – we must divert much needed resources away from the day-to-day services we provide our residents in order to support arrivals.”
For many families on waiting lists, the debate is felt most sharply through housing.
“To be fair everyone has got to be housed, but I think a lot of people already living here are struggling to get properties. I don’t think we are looked after,” said Rachael Craig, 41, a mother of six.
Her friend, 33-year-old mother of three Vanessa Hampson, added: “I am struggling. I have been waiting for six years for a house, for a three bedroom house and am still waiting. They are taking ages to give me one. It’s just a joke.”
Older residents worry that they are being forgotten.
“Money should be spent on making life simpler for older people when they come into town,” said 85-year-old Anthony David-Parkin. “There’s a lot of asylum seekers around here. I miss the library not being in town.”
Yet there are others in town who feel the voices of anger do not speak for the area.
A local resident, who has lived in the area for four years with her children, said that “asylum is a basic human right” and “some of what those seeking asylum have been through is heartbreaking”.
Another, Zoe Broad, 31, said she had seen change but did not believe that was entirely negative. “I have noticed the area has changed. There’s new shops. But in some ways it still feels like the same old area. […] It’s a lot busier,” she said. “It is important. We definitely have a responsibility to house immigrants. We have an obligation as a country to house refugees and asylum seekers.”
“I’ve nothing against it. It’s nice that we are helping others,” said Lidia Guernieri. “If help is needed, then help we should, but we should balance it against other needs.”
Some, like 52-year-old resident Dion Barnard, argue for a bigger, national answer. “I am not sure that local councils should be shouldering the cost, I think somebody should be. We live in one world and everybody deserves a change. The accident of your birth shouldn’t matter, so I think we should be coming up with a plan at a national level. But if the national level is not doing it then I think councils need to step up.”
What everyone seems to agree on is that Uxbridge has changed, and that the strain on services is real. The town’s role as a gateway for those arriving through Heathrow has left it carrying a burden out of all proportion to its size, with one in ten hotel-housed asylum seekers in the country placed in Hillingdon.
For some, it is proof that “this country is finished”, as one lady puts to us. For others, it is a test of Britain’s values and obligations.
For now, Uxbridge stands as a stark example of what happens when national immigration policy hits the streets of one town, and leaves neighbours arguing over who should pay the price.
