Q&A: Who is responsible for housing asylum seekers and refugees?

by Jacqui Broadhead

Who is legally responsible for housing asylum seekers?

The Home Office is responsible for housing asylum seekers who are unable to support their own accommodation, as set out in the 1999 Immigration and Asylum Act. Housing and subsistence support for asylum seekers and those with a pending appeal is provided under Sections 95 and 98 of this Act, and more limited support for refused asylum seekers is provided under Section 4. Accommodation is provided to those who can demonstrate that they would be destitute without it, and asylum seekers must demonstrate that “they do not have adequate accommodation or any means of obtaining it” in order to be accommodated. Some asylum seekers are self-sufficient or supported by family or friends and do not receive this support, though exact numbers are not published.

Since 2000, the Home Office has contracted this responsibility to a number of private providers. In 2025, these are Mears Group, Serco and Clearsprings Ready Homes, who procure and manage properties to house asylum seekers. This includes initial accommodation (for up to the first 4 weeks of accommodation) and dispersal accommodation. Dispersal accommodation typically comprises flats or houses, often set up as houses of multiple occupancy (HMOs). Accommodation is provided on a ‘no-choice’ basis, and asylum seekers do not decide where in the country they are accommodated or the type of accommodation. Since the pandemic, there has been a significant increase in the use of contingency accommodation (predominantly hotels) as covered in the briefing on asylum accommodation.

Are local councils involved in housing asylum seekers?

Local authorities are not directly responsible for the accommodation of asylum seekers, which is procured by the Home Office and managed by private providers.

In 2023, in response to concerns from some areas about the disproportionate burden on some local authorities of dispersal, and to increase overall supply, the Home Office introduced a policy of “full dispersal.” This aimed to ensure a more proportionate distribution of asylum seekers. As part of this change, all local authorities are expected to participate in dispersal, and each region was asked to develop a plan to move towards doing so. This meant that many areas that previously had not received asylum seekers started to do so, and this shift in distribution is outlined in the asylum accommodation briefing.

As part of this change, councils now receive funding per asylum seeker housed in their area. In 2025, local authorities received £1200 per asylum seeker in their area per year and £100 per month for additional bed spaces which are brought into use. This funding is not ringfenced and is intended to provide support for asylum seekers and to mitigate impacts on public services.

One important exception to this is Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children (UASCs). Councils are responsible for supporting these young people through social services and receive funding from the Department for Education to cover these costs. A transfer scheme governs which local authorities support which children in order to ease pressure on particular local authorities that receive a large number of arrivals due to their geography. It mandates that the UASC population in an area should not exceed 0.07% of the child population.

Can councils refuse to house asylum seekers in their area?

Usually, no. As part of the move to full dispersal, all local authorities are expected to participate. Each region has been asked to develop a plan to support a proportionate allocation of asylum seekers, and councils have limited discretion to refuse asylum accommodation in their area.

However, local areas may negotiate with the Home Office and contracted providers (often through regional Strategic Migration Partnerships) about the suitability of proposed accommodation and the need for community consultation and communication. The Home Office aims to take into account market availability, current asylum levels and social pressures to determine the number of bed spaces needed, though some local authorities have expressed disappointment in the lack of consultation over these arrangements.

Local government has wider responsibilities to ensure the safety and suitability of accommodation. For example, they are responsible for regulating licensing requirements, setting out national minimum standards for Houses in Multiple Occupancy (HMO). In 2023, central government proposed exempting asylum accommodation from these requirements, but this plan did not go ahead due to concerns raised by councils that it would lead to a ‘two-tier’ system with lower accommodation standards for asylum seekers than the rest of the population.

Councils may also seek to challenge the Home Office (and hotel providers). In August 2025, Epping Forest district council was granted an injunction by the High Court (subsequently overturned on appeal) to stop a hotel which was housing asylum seekers, on the basis that the hotel had not notified the council of a change of use of the hotel under planning rules. The Home Office said that this decision could “substantially impact” its ability to house asylum seekers across the UK, as other councils may seek similar decisions. A full hearing was due in autumn 2025.

Are councils involved in housing other types of migrants?

Local authorities have direct responsibility in providing accommodation for some resettled refugees for the initial period after their arrival. This has included the Syrian Vulnerable Person’s Resettlement Scheme and its successor the UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS.) Whilst some accommodation for Afghan families was sourced directly by the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence, local authorities have procured accommodation for some families. Other schemes have deliberately sought to place the requirement to find accommodation outside of the responsibility of the state, most notably Homes for Ukraine, in which members of the public acted as hosts. Even in these instances, local authorities retain a ‘backstop’ role in which they may have a responsibility to provide housing if hosting relationships break down. Finally, local government has a responsibility to provide housing to some groups of migrants who are destitute and subject to the No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) condition, including single adults with care needs, parents with dependent children under 18 and care leavers, for which further information is available here.

Do councils have other responsibilities to provide support to asylum seekers?

Alongside providing accommodation or subsistence support for asylum seekers, the Home Office commissions direct support, provided since 2019 by the charity Migrant Help, though it has struggled to meet operational demand. Contracts with housing providers and Migrant Help also cover some wider support, such as promoting the safety and well-being of those accommodated.

Outside of this provision, councils are responsible for wider integration support, though they do not receive direct funding, nor is there specific guidance on what this support should entail (in England). This may include orientation, access to public services, English language classes (which asylum seekers are eligible for after a period of 6 months waiting on a decision), translation and interpretation. Councils also retain their statutory duties in relation to safeguarding for vulnerable adults and children.

What happens when someone is granted refugee status by the Home Office?

When there is a grant of refugee status, responsibility for asylum seekers/ refugee housing shifts from private accommodation providers contracted by the Home Office to local council housing teams, this is known as the ‘move-on’ period and has shifted significantly in the last few years, from 28 days (and a short period when the Home Office dropped this to 7 days) to 56 days initially under the current government. However, the Home Office reverted to the 28-day period for single adults from September 2025. In the move-on period, newly recognised refugees:

• Receive their eVisa (previously Biometric Residence Permit)
• Receive a ‘notice to quit’ from their asylum accommodation
• Must apply for a National Insurance number
• Can apply for universal credit and housing benefit if they require these benefits
• Must present to the local council if they require homelessness assistance
• May need to set up a UK bank account
• May be seeking employment and receiving support to do so from Job Centre Plus

Housing in the UK is a devolved matter, and each of the four nations has distinctive approaches and legal duties. In England, when refugees present seeking homelessness assistance, the council has a legal duty to assess them and must provide help if they are in ‘priority need’ and can demonstrate that they will be homeless within the next 8 weeks (such as through a ‘notice to quit’ from asylum accommodation).

Priority need is defined by several criteria, including the vulnerability of the individual, which can include those with refugee status, but does not include all refugees. For example, many single adult refugees in England will not qualify as having priority need, though different provisions in Scotland mean that more will qualify.

The council will also decide whether they have a longer-term duty to provide accommodation and will work with the individual to develop a personal housing plan. For those eligible, this longer-term offer can include applying for council housing or bidding for a property once on the waiting list, or it may include support to access the private rented sector – such as providing a deposit or acting as a guarantor on a lease.

How is it decided which local authority has responsibility for housing newly granted refugees?

This is decided by whether the refugee has a ‘local connection’ to an area. Living in asylum accommodation means that a refugee has a local connection, and so where people are placed into asylum accommodation matters for where they will subsequently make an application for housing support. However, refugees may also have a local connection in more than one local authority area – for example, if they have family connections elsewhere. In these cases, they may choose which local authority to apply to, but it must be one to which they can prove a local connection.

Why are some local authorities struggling to house newly granted refugees?

Emergency and temporary accommodation is under severe strain, and numbers accommodated reached record highs in England, Scotland and Wales in 2024. English local authorities spent over £2billion on temporary accommodation in 2023/24, a number which has almost doubled over the last five years. This strain is down to both rising demand across the population and a lack of more permanent housing, both private and social, for people to move into.

The move-on process for refugees may have exacerbated this broader pressure. The number of newly granted refugees has increased as the Home Office aims to reduce the backlog of asylum seekers, and in some cases, large numbers of people in the same area are being granted status at the same time. Leaders in cities such as Glasgow have noted the need for better communication about when refugees in a local area will be granted status with the Home Office in order to tackle “utterly untenable” pressures.

Are newly granted refugees eligible for social housing?

Temporary accommodation is the accommodation provided to those assessed to be in need by the council until such time as they can find a permanent place to live. However, due to a lack of permanent accommodation (including social housing), ‘temporary’ accommodation often lasts for many years. High overall demand for social housing means that there are currently over 1.3million people on the waiting list for social housing in England. The average waiting time for social housing in England is 7 years, rising to 27 years in London. This wait is likely to be shorter for those assessed to have a higher degree of need. Whilst there is no published data on the number of refugee households with social tenancies, 7% of people living in social housing in 2021 had a non-UK passport, according to census data, and 10% of new social housing lettings in 2022-3 were to non-UK citizens.

What are the future policy options?

The Labour government committed in its manifesto to end the use of asylum hotels by 2029. The cost of asylum accommodation has been criticised across the political spectrum. Beyond reducing the asylum backlog, proposals to reduce the cost have included moving support for asylum seekers from (relatively expensive) revenue spending, through to greater capital investment, in order to increase the overall supply of accommodation for asylum seekers and the wider population. Another approach would be to focus on working with private providers to increase supply by bringing new types of properties on board, including large or medium sites, though an official audit report found that costs for these sites in the past had been higher than for hotels.

Asylum accommodation contracts run until 2029, with a break clause in 2026. The Home Office is planning pilot projects to trial new approaches to asylum accommodation alongside local authorities. While some argue that devolving asylum would improve community consent and consultation and ease the pressure of move-on between asylum accommodation and mainstream housing, others note the significant additional pressures this could place on local authorities and argue that devolution could fracture the commitment to full dispersal, placing additional burdens on some areas over others.

In England, the 2025 Spending Review committed £950 million of funding to increase the overall supply of temporary accommodation for everyone, alongside longer-term plans to increase the overall supply of social housing through the Social and Affordable Homes scheme.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Lucy Mort for comments on an earlier draft of this briefing.