As of June this year, there were around 85,000 people waiting to hear whether their application for asylum in the UK had been granted.

There have been many attempts to find places for people to live while they await their asylum decision, from repurposed military sites to the Bibby Stockholm barge. But all the while, protests against asylum seekers being placed in accommodation around the country have continued, and the anger and fear over asylum seekers’ presence has only grown more intense.

Britain has a big problem. Over 1.3 million households are on local authority waiting lists for affordable, secure rental housing, and over 135,000 households are currently accommodated by councils in temporary housing. Meanwhile, we are accommodating 107,000 people whilst they await the determination of their asylum claims.

It is obvious why this is such a politically contentious issue. There is simply not enough affordable housing to go round, so who gets what is also about who doesn’t get what. That matters when the “what” is a home.

We spend about £10m a day paying for temporary accommodation for people who would literally have nowhere else to stay – both those people awaiting the determination of their asylum claims and homeless people who local authorities have a duty to house. That £10m a day is not building even one more affordable home, and some private landlords and hotel owners are getting very rich indeed.

This should and can be different. We could be solving both problems simultaneously.

Imagine this instead: rather than renting flats, houses or hotel rooms from private landlords and businesses we instead build or buy more homes to be owned by local councils or housing associations. Those homes are then used to meet the needs of current local tenants in overcrowded homes, or who are struggling to live in homes that don’t meet their needs.

Councils and housing associations would need government grants to afford this. In exchange, they would have to agree to use an equivalent number of homes to meet temporary accommodation needs for the next five years, including people waiting for asylum decisions.

This both saves money over the next five years, and means at the end of the period we will have increased the number of council and housing association homes available to rent long term. We’re meeting the need for temporary housing and solving the long term housing crisis at the same time.

Local communities get the benefit of more good quality homes that meet the needs of local people. Those in need of temporary accommodation get to live in well-maintained properties in local communities across the country rather than in a few places where private landlords can make the highest profits. And the long-term legacy of the current need to accommodate a high number of people waiting for their asylum claims to be determined is more long term affordable housing for rent by households on local authority waiting lists.

The maths here is compelling. The money currently being spent on accommodating asylum seekers is eye-watering, and the accommodation itself is often horrible for people to live in. Hotel bedrooms are expensive, and refurbishing MoD bases is even more expensive. Buying houses isn’t cheap either, but councils and housing associations can cover some of those costs through the rent they will get on those homes, so all that is needed is a grant to cover the gap between what that home costs to buy and how much borrowing the rent can support. Taking profit out of the system helps too.

A capital fund of £2.1bn (the amount the government spent on providing hotel accommodation for asylum seekers in 2024/25 alone) would enable the purchase and renovation of around 10,000 homes across England. The costs of the grant to buy these homes would be repaid by savings on hotel rooms in about nine months, and would then save over £4m a day compared to current hotel spend.

Once an asylum claim is determined, anyone granted the right to remain goes into the same housing system as everyone else. So we’re not buying properties for asylum seekers. We’re buying houses and flats so we can start to meet the country’s need for temporary accommodation with properties which councils and housing associations own, rather than funnelling public money to private landlords.

The government does not have a “magic money tree”. This is why it is so important that every single pound is spent well. Right now, the £10m a day spent on temporary accommodation across local authorities and the Home Office could be spent much better. Repurposing the money being spent on hotel accommodation and refurbishing old MoD bases is the most cost effective place to start.

In order for this to happen we need to acknowledge that neither homelessness nor people seeking asylum are short term issues. Paying for accommodation on a short term basis robs us of the opportunity to respond rationally. Increasing the number of homes owned by councils and housing associations would enable us to cut the cost of meeting our national need for temporary accommodation now, whilst delivering more affordable housing long term.