My friend lives in Epping, the upmarket Essex town where tensions over asylum seekers turned violent over the weekend.
In her late 50s, she’s ferociously independent and I’ve never worried about her before. We met as journalists working in London.
But as I read the news reports, I realised her home is a stone’s throw from The Bell Hotel, the former coaching inn now used by the Government to house single refugee men.
I confess that, living in north London, I hadn’t really given much thought to the impact of the migrant housing situation on local communities until I read about the clashes near my friend’s house. They were sparked by the arrest of an asylum seeker over an alleged sexual assault on a 14-year-old girl – and reflect genuine fears that the area is no longer safe for women and children.
My friend has no children but lives alone in a delightful Victorian two-up-two-down with a tiny garden, just behind the main road. It’s about a 15-minute walk to The Bell Hotel – a bit too close for comfort for my liking.
Thinking of her, I could suddenly understand how a large number of single men (the 79-room Bell Hotel has housed 100 men on and off since 2020) could upset the equilibrium of this well-heeled town.
My friend is not a racist or a bigot – in fact, when we spoke about it, she said she’s met some of the young men living in the hotel who told her they were off into London to learn English. So a significant number of them are doing their best. But the reality is these are men from countries with very different values from our own.
The Bell Hotel, she tells me, was closed during the pandemic but provided accommodation for a few asylum seeker families.
The 79-room Bell Hotel, a former coaching inn, has housed 100 men on and off since 2020
You can’t write all the Epping demonstrators off as racist Tommy Robinson acolytes, writes Jenni Murray
It was expected The Bell would reopen as a hotel after Covid and the town was unsurprisingly upset when they heard that the families had been moved away from the town and that a large number of young men were to be housed there instead. She acknowledges there have been problems – particularly one young man who set fire to his room, endangering life. And she admits that the shops in town have been badly affected and suspects a degree of money laundering is going on.
She’s keen not to lay all the blame on the migrants. She’s only too aware that we have plenty of homegrown criminals, but she does seem disappointed that what felt like a calm, safe town has been marred by the immigration crisis.
And the fact is the asylum seekers could well be living at The Bell for years. We have a terrible shortage of housing nationwide and it’s not clear how these huge numbers of men can find employment and be given permission to work and earn a living.
My friend professes not to be nervous about her own safety – thankfully, she’s been on holiday in Wales these past weeks – but I am on her behalf. Certainly, I know I would be scared to be living by myself close to a hotel full of groups of bored young men. She’s tough, my friend, but she’d be no match if something did kick off.
Police figures published this week show the number of people charged with sexual offences in London has almost doubled in the past seven years and that 38 per cent of those charged are foreign nationals.
We’ve got plenty of nasty, abusive homegrown men already. We don’t need any more, especially if they’re from cultures where men are likely to have even less respect for women and girls than British men have.
Effective border controls are part of the answer with speedy analysis of who might have a right to stay and those who do not. But we also need to pay more heed to where we house refugees.
So far, 14 people have been charged over the protests, but you can’t write all the Epping demonstrators off as racist Tommy Robinson acolytes. Some of them are just normal local women like my friend who have seen the dynamic of their town changed by ill-thought-through Government policy.
I understand why many genuinely fear for their safety. And why, when it comes to dumping large groups of single male illegal immigrants in towns rather than perhaps more suitable accommodation such as military barracks, they feel enough is enough. I wouldn’t want them round the corner from me either.
You can’t hold back time, Mariah
Mariah Carey says she simply ignores the passage of time
Ms Carey, 56, doesn’t look a day over 20 in her latest cover shoot for Harper’s Bazaar, says Jenni Murray
Mariah Carey is one of the world’s most famous pop singers – and has been for three decades.
She’s 56, but in her latest cover shoot for Harper’s Bazaar doesn’t look a day over 20. She says she doesn’t have birthdays and simply ignores the passage of time.
‘Ageing doesn’t happen to me,’ she says. ‘I won’t allow it.’ She does avoid harsh light and heavy make-up, eats no carbohydrates, lives on Norwegian salmon and capers and sleeps around 15 hours a night.
Sorry, Mariah, you can try every wellness fad going but I promise you, ageing will get you in the end.
Can this get me off the sofa?
Yes please to the new little gadget you attach to the ear which electrically stimulates the vagus nerve and leads to improvements in fitness and makes exercise easier. I need all the help I can get.
- Oh dear, another victim of cost-cutting is the home-baked scone offered by cafes at National Trust houses. Job cuts among kitchen staff mean they’ll have to ship them in.I would urge a rethink. After all, what’s the point of trailing round a stuffy historic house if there’s no delicious reward to be had at the end?
Why has male Pill taken SO long?
I feel like scientists have been talking about a male contraceptive pill for decades. Now, they say, they’re finally close to launching a non-hormonal one that stops the production of sperm, after successful tests on British men.
Apparently, they’ve been trying to mitigate any side-effects such as mood swings – no matter that women have had to put up with these since the female Pill hit shelves more than 60 years ago.
