Thread by @MhairiHunter

I have to do another thread about this because there is so much dishonesty and really sick spin coming from an element of Labour. 1/13

https://twitter.com/DrRJSimpson/status/1979132330229858690

This is a UK wide issue, it is an outcome of asylum policy, not of Glasgow City Council's homelessness policy. I would highlight two core drivers. Firstly asylum seekers are not allowed to work while their claims are processed (with a very limited exemption). 2/13

If their claim for asylum is accepted, they are given 28 days to leave the accommodation provided to them by the Home Office. That's not enough time for people to be able to source their own accommodation, so the system effectively pushes them into homelessness. 3/13

The 2nd major factor is the asylum backlog. This was allowed to build up by the Tories with 100s of 1000s of outstanding cases & appeals. This is the main reason so many asylum seekers are in hotels, as the system is bursting at the seams. 4/13

The priority for the UK gov is to work through that backlog asap, in large part so they can get asylum seekers out of hotels & remove that attack line from Reform. They are right to do this but wrong to ignore the knock on effects for local authorities. Let me explain. 5/13

Once an asylum claim is accepted, the claimant is granted leave to remain in the UK and so they come within the scope of local authorities. This means that when they get kicked out of their Home Office provided accommodation they are directed towards homelessness services. 6/13

It's really important to understand this is how the asylum system works. It does not give asylum seekers the option of being able to stand on their own feet. It makes them dependent on state support and explicitly pushes them into local authority homelessness services. 7/13

As we've seen, to clear the backlog asylum claims are now being expedited quickly resulting in large numbers of refugees coming into those homelessness services all at once, which the system can't cope with. So we have a crisis situation, with a big spike in homelessness. 8/13

To reiterate, this is a UK wide issue but let's now look at the specific situation with Glasgow. It is true that large numbers of homeless refugees are being drawn to Glasgow because our services are better than in the rest of the UK. 9/13

This is a problem for us - but it is not a fault! It's incredible to watch Labour people lining up to condemn Glasgow for providing better services for homeless people than other cities do, as though that is a bad thing. That's actually sick. 10/13

It is not a sustainable situation for us but the answer is not to make our services worse! It is for other councils to do more to help & for the UK gov to provide funding to enable that. And to compensate Glasgow for the additional expenditure we have already incurred. 11/13

That's what Labour politicians should be saying. Instead you get some describing a council trying to help homeless people stay off the streets as "virtue signalling". It's not virtue signalling - it is what we are meant to do! 12/13

It's some level of twisted spin to try and turn a crisis which is the direct outcome of UK gov actions into an attack on a council for trying to fulfil its statutory obligations to provide homeless people with a roof over their heads. But that's where we are now. Sickening. 13/13