Conclusion 15

We asked the Home Office whether it was still satisfied that it was getting value for money, given the costs of the accommodation and the fact that capacity was much lower than anticipated. The Home Office’s latest assessment of value for money from January 2024 suggests that, in total, large accommodation sites will cost £46 million more than the hotels they are intended to replace. The Home Office told us that it was confident that when all the sunk costs were excluded it was still cheaper to continue with the large sites, and considered that it was correct to exclude sunk costs as projections should only be forward looking.25 However, it acknowledged that for the site at Scampton, it would not have gone ahead in the way that it did if it had known more about the site at the outset. It said that the large number of people it anticipated having on the site was driving up the costs because it would have needed additional modular accommodation, and it had recently been in discussions with the local authority about reducing the number of people at the site to “hundreds rather than thousands”. It said that it was planning to reduce the capacity at the two former RAF bases due to cost, operational capacity and safety. They would now each hold around 800 people, which the National Audit Office reported would reduce the value for money of Wethersfield by £54 million. The Accounting Officer told us that he updates the value for money assessments every three months, and will keep that under review.26 22 Q 206; C&AG’s Report, Asylum accommodation, Figure 11 23 Public Accounts Committee, Competition in public procurement, Sixth report of Session 2023–24, HC 385, December 2023 24 Q 210; C&AG’s Report, Asylum accommodation, para 4.6 25 Qq 179–180; C&AG’s Report, Asylum accommodation, Figure 7 26 Qq 182–183, 202; C&AG’s Report, Asylum accommodation, para 3.9 Asylum Accommodation and UK-Rwanda partnership 13 2 Making plans work for others Ensuring the well-being of those it inten