Skylark Hotel, Rochford

The Skylark Hotel is a 76 room four star property set in seven acres of land on Aviation Way next to Southend Airport. Before the August 2022 Home Office contract, the site was a popular venue for business travellers, weddings and airport passengers, with a restaurant and bar open to the public.

Your Southend reported that the hotel was originally brought into the Home Office contingency accommodation scheme in August 2022 on a 12 month deal, with the contract since extended several times; families and single residents were still housed at the site at the time of the August 2025 report^[1]Press.

In 2023, asylum-seeker families living at the Skylark Hotel were sending at least 20 children to Southend area schools including Chase High School, Heycroft Primary School and Eastwood Primary, with schools reporting significant pressure on stretched resources, English as an additional language teaching, translation tools and pastoral support. By February 2026 the Echo/Gazette News reported the Rochford district hotel asylum population had fallen from 138 to 99 residents^[2]Press.

JURIST reported calls from the Reform UK leader on Southend Council, Cllr Tony Cox, for action to stop the Skylark Hotel being used for asylum accommodation, citing the Epping Forest Bell Hotel High Court injunction as a possible precedent^[3]Press.

At the £170 per person per night Migration Observatory benchmark^[4], the February 2026 figure of 99 residents implies headline taxpayer exposure of about £16,830 per night and roughly £6.14 million per year. That is broadly in line with the May 2025 NAO contract review average of about £5.84 million per year per hotel^[5]NAO.