Why hasn’t the government shut these two hotels down and moved the children to a safe location? Why are these gangs able to target vulnerable children with impunity?

The government’s position is that it wants to end the use of all hotels as soon as possible, but it has said nothing about how it will do this or why it won’t end the use of these specific two high-risk hotels (in Brighton and Hythe) immediately. They claim that they have no choice but to use hotels to house minors.

There is a serious lack of coordinated action between child protection services and the police, and a complete dereliction of duty from the Home Office.

The government’s position is that it is the responsibility of local authorities to coordinate action. But we want national government, specifically the Home Office, to take responsibility for the coordination between children’s services and the police. Especially as the children are disappearing from Home Office-run hotels and they are the department responsible for overseeing the refugee regime.

For hundreds of children to vanish demonstrates the appalling scale of dangerous trafficking gang activity in this country. For too long, this Conservative government has failed to properly crack down on these criminal networks.

“200 asylum-seeking children are missing and the government’s lack of action is shameful”