MPs decry ‘shocking conditions’ at facilities for asylum seekers

Yvette Cooper, chair of home affairs committee, wrote to Priti Patel after visiting Kent sites on Tuesday

MPs have raised serious concerns about the shocking conditions" they found in Kent holding facilities for asylum seekers, including an unaccompanied child housed in an office space for 10 days, and a girl forced to sleep on a sofa for days on end.

Yvette Cooper, chair of the home affairs select committee, has written to the home secretary following a committee visit on Tuesday when MPs saw asylum seekers held in cramped, unsafe and completely inappropriate" facilities.