Council loses Supreme Court bid over Home Office role in asylum seeker case
Epping Forest District Council cannot challenge a decision to allow the Home Office to intervene in its unsuccessful bid to temporarily block asylum seekers staying at the Bell Hotel
Epping Forest District Council (EFDC) cannot challenge a decision to allow the Home Office to intervene in its unsuccessful bid to temporarily block asylum seekers staying at the Bell Hotel earlier this year, the Supreme Court has ruled.
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In August, the local authority asked the High Court to issue a temporary injunction blocking asylum seekers from staying at the Essex hotel after it became a focal point of a series of protests over the summer.
The council claimed that accommodating asylum seekers at the site breached planning rules, while the site’s owner, Somani Hotels, opposed the claim.
Mr Justice Eyre granted the temporary injunction on August 19 ahead of a full hearing of the legal claim.
The judge also refused the Home Office’s bid to intervene in the case, which he said was “not necessary”.
Read more: Council to seek appeal against High Court ruling over Epping asylum hotel
The Court of Appeal then overturned both decisions on August 29, with three judges finding that the department could “materially contribute to the judicial decision-making” in the case and that the decision to grant the temporary injunction was “seriously flawed in principle”.
EFDC then sought to take the case to the Supreme Court, arguing that the Court of Appeal was wrong to allow the Home Office to intervene in the case.
On Monday, the Supreme Court said that permission to appeal against the decision was refused by Lord Reed, Lord Leggatt and Lady Simler on Wednesday.
Giving the reasons for the refusal, the Supreme Court website said: “The application does not raise an arguable point of law of general public importance.”
The Supreme Court decision comes just weeks after the council saw its bid for a permanent injunction dismissed earlier in November after a full hearing of its legal challenge.
Lawyers for the authority told a three-day hearing in October that the housing of asylum seekers is a “material change of use” and has caused “increasingly regular protests”.
Barristers for Somani Hotels said it “firmly disputed” the council’s claim, while the Home Office told the court that the authority’s bid was “misconceived”.
In a ruling on November 11, Mr Justice Mould said that an injunction was not a “commensurate response to that postulated breach of planning control”, which he said was “far from being flagrant”.
He said: “Taking a broad view, the degree of planning and environmental harm resulting from the current use of the Bell is limited.
“The continuing need for hotels as an important element of the supply of contingency accommodation to house asylum seekers in order to enable the Home Secretary to discharge her statutory responsibilities is a significant counterbalancing factor.”
The council has since said it will appeal against Mr Justice Mould’s ruling, following a vote by councillors.
The Bell became the focal point of several protests and counter-protests in the summer after an asylum seeker housed there was charged with sexually assaulting a teenage girl in Epping in July.
Ethiopian national Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was sentenced to 12 months in prison in September, before being mistakenly released from jail and has since been deported.
The Bell has been used to house single adult males since April, and first housed asylum seekers from May 2020 to March 2021.
It accommodated single adult males from October 2022 to April 2024, during which the council took no enforcement action.
The High Court heard that the company applied for planning permission for a “temporary change of use” in February 2023, but later withdrew the application as it had not been determined by April 2024.