The boss of a agency which made a fortune housing asylum seekers in circumstances described as squalid has spent £1.1million on a mansion. Former Military main James Vyvyan-Robinson, 64, and his spouse Nicola splashed out on a brand new dwelling in Perthshire.
Vyvyan-Robinson is managing director of Clearsprings Prepared Properties, which raked in £28million of earnings final yr. It's contracted by the Residence Workplace to run resorts and different lodging for asylum seekers. However some websites – akin to Napier Barracks in Folkestone, Kent – have been dogged by criticism. When Covid struck, residents protested about sharing with those that have been contaminated.
After a go to in February by the All-Celebration Parliamentary Group on Immigration Detention, MPs and friends referred to as for the barracks to be shut down. Services have been described as “filthy and decrepit”. The MPs’ report mentioned Napier was in an “extraordinarily poor” state, that there was insufficient safeguarding of the susceptible and a “close to complete lack of privateness”.
Tim Naor Hilton, CEO of the charity Refugee Motion, mentioned: “The Authorities is losing public cash and permitting its
contractors to make hundreds of thousands whereas offering substandard, unsafe lodging for individuals who come to the UK in the hunt for safety. Asylum lodging is of a disgracefully low normal and other people have skilled critical danger of hurt whereas housed there.”
One other Clearspring camp –Penally in Pembrokeshire, Wales – was closed in March. Inspectors discovered it was “rundown and unsuitable”, lacked Covid safety and hearth security. In addition they discovered residents’ psychological well being was deteriorating. Poor circumstances have been uncovered at different Clearsprings websites, together with 18 flats in Uxbridge, west London, which have been present in January to be rife with damp, mould, water leaks and pest infestations.
Final October, the agency was ordered to pay greater than £60,000 in fines and prices at Newport Magistrates’ Courtroom. Offences included working a home of a number of occupancy with out a licence and failing to make sure firefighting gear and that fireside alarms have been maintained in good working order.
Clearsprings, which has a registered enterprise tackle in Rayleigh, Essex, has a 10-year contract ending in 2029 to handle asylum seeker lodging. Accounts present annual earnings to January 2022 rocketed from £4,419,841 to £28,012,487. A spokesman for Clearsprings mentioned: “We have now no remark to make.”
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