The controversy did not prevent the project from succeeding. A first group of asylum seekers settled on Monday aboard the “Bibby Stockholm”, a huge barge at the quay in the south-west of England, which has become a symbol of the fight against immigration initiated by the British government.
In difficulty in the polls a year from the next legislative elections, the head of the conservative government Rishi Sunak has made the need to “stop the boats” which illegally cross the Channel a priority and has multiplied initiatives in recent days. One of them consists in installing asylum seekers on barges at the quay in order to save money in the reception of migrants while deterring potential asylum candidates.
A first group boarded Monday aboard the “Bibby Stockholm”, a barge 93 meters long by 27 wide, moored in the port of Portland. With its 222 cabins, it is supposed to accommodate up to 500 migrants.
sea trauma
In Portland, the project has created controversy and angered local residents, some fearing for their safety while others denounce a “floating prison” at the foot of their island of some 13,000 inhabitants. The authorities refute this term and assure that asylum seekers will be able to enter and leave as they please. The port of Portland is the only one in the country to have agreed to moor such a barge. Other similar projects had to be abandoned for lack of home ports.
The NGO for the defense of migrants Care4Calais again denounced Monday a “cruel” and “inhuman” system, ensuring that some of the asylum seekers it accompanies “have survived torture and modern slavery, and have gone through traumatic experiences at sea”.