The three-storey-high barge was billed by the Home Office as a way of providing "cheaper and more orderly accommodation for those arriving in small boats".
The latest delay is understood to have been to allow checks to take place amid fire safety concerns about the vessel, which arrived in Portland, Dorset, behind schedule last month.
Yet it is just one of a number of eye-catching - for better or worse - plans associated with Sunak's "stop the boats" pledge that have struggled to start.
While the notion of "offshoring" asylum seekers had its roots in Priti Patel's stint as home secretary, it was earlier this year, on Suella Braverman's watch, that the use of floating barges to help reduce a £6m-a-day bill for hotel rooms emerged. It coincides with the less than smooth rollout of another part of the alternative accommodation project: using disused RAF bases in Lincolnshire and Essex to house asylum seekers.
This story is from the August 02, 2023 edition of The Guardian.
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This story is from the August 02, 2023 edition of The Guardian.
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