Epping Forest District Council is challenging a High Court ruling that rejected its attempt to prevent asylum seekers from being accommodated at a hotel.
The Essex authority is seeking to overturn Mr Justice Mould’s November decision, which declined to issue an injunction stopping The Bell Hotel’s owners from using the premises to house asylum seekers.
The Epping establishment became the epicenter for intense demonstrations both for and against asylum accommodation last summer.
At Thursday’s Court of Appeal hearing in London, the council’s legal team argued there was a “compelling reason” to allow the challenge of the hotel’s use to proceed, contending that the original judge had reached the wrong conclusion.
Philip Coppel KC, representing the local authority, told the court that converting hotels from public use to exclusive asylum seeker accommodation had “become a matter of public concern” over the past year.
This concern arose because such conversions occurred “without any planning consideration”, he argued.
The barrister emphasised that the alleged breach of planning regulations could not be separated from the decision on whether to grant an injunction.
He said: “You cannot disassociate what we say was the breach of planning control, the gravity of the breach of planning control, and the ramifications of the breach of planning control, from the exercise of discretion to grant or refuse an injunction.”
The Bell Hotel has been the centre of protests | PABoth Somani Hotels, which owns the property, and the Home Office are opposing the council’s appeal bid.
The Bell Hotel has a lengthy history of accommodating asylum seekers, having first been used for this purpose between May 2020 and March 2021, before housing single adult males from October 2022 until April 2024, during which time the council took no enforcement action.
The hotel became a focal point for heated protests and counter-protests last summer during its third period of asylum accommodation, following charges against a resident for the sexual assault of a teenage girl in Epping in July.
Frequent, almost weekly protests occurred outside the Bell Hotel on High Road, which often turned sour.
Multiple protests have happened outside The Bell Hotel in Epping since the assault | PAWith each protest, droves of attendees were arrested by Essex police for allegedly assaulting emergency workers, with one attendee arrested after allegedly driving under the influence and crashing.
The council secured a temporary injunction in August blocking the site’s use, citing planning rule violations.
However, the Court of Appeal subsequently overturned this decision, deeming it “seriously flawed in principle”.
Mr Justice Mould later rejected the council’s application for a permanent injunction, ruling the planning breach was “far from being flagrant”.
Their lawyers accused the council of doing an “unjustified disservice to the judge’s comprehensive analysis of the law”.
Jenny Wigley KC, acting for Somani Hotels, stated in written submissions that the company “firmly resists” the appeal attempt, characterising the council’s grounds as “mere disagreements with the judge” that should not “be entitled to take up court time”.
The Home Office, intervening in the proceedings, was equally dismissive of the council’s position.
James Strachan KC, representing the government department, argued in written submissions that the injunction claim was “misguided” and ought to be dismissed as it had “no real prospect of success”.
The judge had previously concluded it was “not a case in which it is just and convenient for this court to grant an injunction”.
