Reform UK Councillor Matthew Caton, the Portfolio Holder for Children & Young People at Wakefield Council, told GB News that he is deeply concerned about the recent criminal allegations.
He said: “Urban House has been operating in various guises since 2007 – it shut down in 2011, we believe, for health and safety and living concerns, and reopened again a few months later as asylum seeker accommodation.”
“The capacity of this place is three hundred or more beds, and the current occupation is between 200 and 260, so it’s a substantial facility. It’s the largest of its type in the Yorkshire and the Humber region. When it comes to a dispersal centre, it should be operating within a two- to three-day window to disperse out of the community.
“In actuality, that’s looking two to three months. In the past, that’s been as much as two to three years. These people are in this facility in our district with very little vetting, very few checks. We have no eyes on them as a council. The Home Office just imposes them on us and into our district.
“So when it comes to safeguarding of children, for instance, we’re absolutely blind in many instances. There are concerns about the direction of travel nationally when it comes to the protection of children.
“We see the information when these people are potentially processing out of the centre, so in my capacity as safeguarding children and young people, how am I meant to protect the children and young people of this district, when I have no idea who’s coming in and out of this facility?”