EARLIER this year, I submitted a Freedom of Information request to the UK Home Office asking for basic transparency on asylum housing arrangements, with specific reference to Serco. This is a company whose total contract revenue for its Asylum Accommodation and Support Contract (AASC) with the Home Office is estimated to be £1.9 billion over a 10-year period, according to UK Parliament records. This contract, awarded in 2019, covers providing housing in the North West of England, the Midlands, and the East of England.
The Home Office’s official Freedom of Information (FOI) response revealed troubling contradictions with its actual obligations outlined in its asylum housing contract with Serco. While the Home Office claims it holds no information on five-year rent deals or risk assessments for asylum seeker housing, the AASC contract, which Serco is bound by, clearly requires providers to keep detailed, auditable records. It also grants the Home Office the right to access them.
Specifically, I asked:
- For a list of councils where Serco had signed accommodation agreements;
- For copies of guidance or agreements issued to Serco regarding private rented housing and landlord incentives;
- For financial records relating to five-year rent guarantees;
- And for any risk assessments on the impact of expanded private housing.
Extraordinarily, the Home Office said it doesn’t hold any of that information.
In answer to the first two points, it simply pointed me toward a generic online contract, that contained nothing about which councils are involved, nor any documents about how those agreements are structured.
Regarding the financial and risk assessment questions, it issued a flat denial, copied below: ‘The Home Office does not hold this information.‘ My request for a review of this response follows on.
I have demanded a review for the very reason that the very contract it signed – the Asylum Accommodation Support Contract (AASC) – requires providers like Serco to keep detailed, auditable records. Furthermore, it also gives the Home Office the right to access them.
But the Home Office denies holding anything (or refuses to access them?), so councils’ contracts with Serco stay hidden while Serco itself, not being part of Government, isn’t subject to FOI requests.
A triangle of unaccountability that I break down and explain in my filmed report below.
This article was first published on Lewis’ substack on June 3 and is republished here by kind permission
