'Unacceptable' conditions at Manston asylum centre

Conditions at a processing centre for asylum seekers who arrive on the Kent coast in small boats have been described as unacceptable in a report from a watchdog that monitors the centre

- Diane Taylor

Representatives from the Independent Monitoring Boards made a total of 85 visits in 2022 to three Home Office processing centres for small boat arrivals - Manston, Western Jet Foil and Kent Intake Unit for its 2022 annual report on short-term holding facilities on the Kent coast.

All three centres hit the headlines last year owing to a variety of scandals and serious incidents.

The IMB report found that the facilities struggled to cope with an increasing number of arrivals and identified "serious concerns about the conditions in which people were being held, particularly at Manston". The report adds: "At Manston detained individuals were accommodated in marquees which we would describe as at best basic, at worst unsanitary and unacceptable."