Novotel Long Eaton, Bostocks Lane

The Novotel Nottingham Derby is a four star, 108 bedroom hotel that sits on Bostocks Lane in Sandiacre, immediately adjacent to junction 25 of the M1 and within Erewash borough. From early 2022 it was withdrawn from public booking and used by the Home Office under the East Midlands Asylum Accommodation and Support Services contract held by Serco. It operated as the larger of the two Bostocks Lane asylum hotels, alongside the still active Best Western Long Eaton on the same road^[4]Press.

The Bostocks Lane site was widely treated by national and local press as a single twin site asylum cluster. The Novotel and the adjacent Best Western Long Eaton between them housed a combined 400 single adult males at peak. Residents at both hotels reported being spat at and verbally abused on the surrounding streets in 2023, with the area becoming a focus of repeated local press coverage^[4]Press.

When the Novotel contract ended, the Best Western on the same road remained in continuous Home Office use under Serco and stayed the only asylum hotel in Erewash.

On 14 March 2024, the Home Office confirmed the Novotel would exit asylum use at the end of July 2024. Erewash MP Maggie Throup hailed the announcement as a triumph, crediting a sustained constituency campaign that included raising the Bostocks Lane hotels with the Prime Minister and the Immigration Minister. Throup said her attention would now turn to lobbying for the closure of the adjacent Best Western on the same road^[1]GOV.UK^[2]Press.

When the Novotel contract ended on 31 July 2024, more than 100 people sought homelessness support from Derbyshire authorities after being required to leave Home Office accommodation, with 105 households recorded as needing assistance from Erewash Borough Council and Derbyshire County Council. Other Novotel residents were dispersed to alternative asylum accommodation outside Erewash^[3]Press.

At the £170 per person per night Migration Observatory benchmark^[5], a peak headcount of 240 residents implies headline taxpayer exposure of around £40,800 per night and roughly £14.9 million per year. Across the roughly two and a half years of asylum use from 2022 to 31 July 2024 the cumulative spend on the Novotel alone is on the order of £35 million before accounting for the parallel Best Western contract on the same road. The May 2025 NAO contract review put the average per hotel run rate across the wider portfolio at about £5.84 million per year^[6]NAO.