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Essex Reform council deploys £150,000 security guards in towns near asylum seeker base amid women's safety fears

Norfolk Police reported officers faced "significant aggression" across three nights of Thetford disorder, including one struck by a thrown stone, one bitten, and one spat at in the face.
Norfolk Police reported officers faced "significant aggression" across three nights of Thetford disorder, including one struck by a thrown stone, one bitten, and one spat at in the face.
Peter Harris has warned he will "not sit on his hands and wait for the next incident" as the Home Office prepares to expand Wethersfield's single male asylum population by 50 per cent to 1,245.
Peter Harris has warned he will "not sit on his hands and wait for the next incident" as the Home Office prepares to expand Wethersfield's single male asylum population by 50 per cent to 1,245.

Essex County Council leader Peter Harris has launched Operation Vanguard, placing two private security guards in each of Braintree, Colchester and Chelmsford as the Home Office readies an expansion of nearby Wethersfield — a former RAF base currently home to around 800 single male asylum seekers — to a capacity of 1,245. Harris argued that migrants arriving at the site receive an induction that is "woefully inadequate, especially on their introduction to British culture and the expectations we have of acceptable behaviour toward women and girls." Critics have pointed to a fundamental weakness: the guards hold no greater legal authority than an ordinary member of the public.

Harris said the council "will not sit on its hands and wait for the next incident" as migrant numbers at Wethersfield are set to grow by around 50 per cent.

The Home Office maintains that crime levels in surrounding town centres show no uplift attributable to asylum seekers at the site.

Labour branded it "gesture politics", accusing Reform of spending £150,000 of taxpayers' money on a scheme their own paperwork admits is largely symbolic.

MoreAOL News UKReform council blasted over desperate £150,000 stunt for 'operatives' to monitor migrantsEvening StandardReform UK council to spend £150k on security guards in areas near asylum baseGB NewsMigrant crisis: Reform council deploys private security guards amid women's safety fears over asylum seeker centre
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