THE owners of a hotel that was set to house up to 50 asylum seekers have hit out at the MP who blocked their plans.
James and Anne McTear, who own the Cumberland Hotel in Workington, had been due to welcome the asylum seekers on September 9, in a deal with the Home Office and Serco.
But the controversial plans were put on hold after Workington MP Mark Jenkinson intervened, with concerns that the deprived ward would not be a suitable location.
Mr and Mrs McTear, who have been running the business for 30 years, have disputed comments made by the MP that the area has suffered high rates of anti-social behaviour.
Mrs McTear said: “The asylum seekers are in Whitehaven and everywhere. For Mark Jenkinson to say that we’re a hotspot for drugs and crime is very wrong.
“Carlisle’s councils haven’t prevented them from going in there or in Whitehaven. So why has he stepped in? He knows nothing about the place.
“Everything was in order. The Home Office thought it was a wonderful place for them.
“Three or four days before they were due to come in, Mark Jenkinson put a stop to it. It’s not on. It’s just a dreadful situation.”
Mr McTear said: “We went through all the Home Office investigations for about a month and a half. We had to modify the hotel to suit what they wanted.”
The couple had cancelled a contract they held to accommodate people on coach tours, ahead of the asylum seekers’ arrival.
Mr McTear said he and his wife had lived all over the world while he was in the Royal Navy and they understood the 'absolute poverty' in which asylum seekers live.
He said: “They are asylum seekers because they are trying to find a better life. I have no doubt that there will be one or two who have lived a life of crime and they may get in and think it’s pretty good.
“You can’t differentiate because of their colour or creed. If they come here and behave themselves, take a new job, then great.
“They are fighting to survive. You have got to make it so they have a reason to live.
“If you’re living in poverty, Wetherspoons and the Carnegie are not in your experience. All you want is a drink of clean water and something to prove that you’re worth being alive.”
The hotel was used to accommodate homeless people during lockdown as part of the ‘Everyone In’ campaign.
Mr McTear said: “We were approached by four councils and asked if we would take the vulnerable who were on the streets.
“Every room was filled throughout the two years. Quite a few of them had problems.
“The number of people who have stayed there and come back to see my wife, and said, ‘we’ve never been treated the way you have treated us.’”
Mark Jenkinson, Workington MP, said: “I have been clear in my correspondence with ministers, with the Home Office, with constituents and with Mr McTear, that my priority in St Michaels - a ward in which I resided for most of my life to date - remains the wellbeing and prosperity of my constituents.
“It remains the wrong location for an influx of young, male economic migrants who have paid criminal gangs sums that many of my constituents can only dream of, to cross the channel illegally.
“I have made that case to Mr McTear and again just this morning to the Immigration Minister, Robert Jenrick.”
READ MORE: Controversial plans to house asylum seekers in Workington hotel halted
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