Andy Burnham insisted the poorest parts of the country can't be the only ones to take in asylum seekers - and GB News has found the areas with none
Thirteen more migrant hotels are closing down, the Home Office said last night in its continued bid to reopen the sites to the public and save on the extortionate costs of keeping "asylum seekers" there.
The 13 closures are expected to save taxpayers £51million - and bring the total number of migrant hotels below 160, the Home Office said.
But the number of asylum seekers living in Britain is at its highest level ever.
Most of them are kept far from the wealthier South East - home to less than seven per cent of all asylum seekers in the country.
The North, Yorkshire, the Midlands, Wales and Northern Ireland account for 59.3 per cent of all Home Office asylum accommodation in the UK - with the North West accounting for nearly a fifth by itself.
Today, every single council area in the North and Yorkshire is home to asylum seekers, while fifth of councils in the South East and South West have no asylum seekers at all.
Those figures include hotels, but 68,719 migrants lived in what the department calls "dispersal accommodation" by the end of the first quarter of this year.
This is mainly made up of controversial houses of multiple occupation (HMOs).
Councils across the North West, as well as Glasgow and Belfast, are among the areas with the most migrants in HMOs.
HMOs were thrust back into the spotlight last week when fury broke out in Thetford and protesters tried to storm homes thought to be housing illegal migrants, while locals were left "betrayed" when migrants were secretly moved into the tiny Welsh village of Gronant.
Yesterday Andy Burnham promised that wealthy areas would house more migrants and "play their part".
But Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp accused him of "planning to dish out another vindictive punishment beating to the UK's middle classes".
"Labour has hammered hard-working families with punitive tax increases galore, increased regulation and soaring energy bills," he said.
"Now, Burnham plans to deliberately flood more neighbourhoods with thousands of illegal immigrants who he has let into this country, and many of whom will commit serious crimes including rape and murder."
GB News has examined the parts of the country whose streets and houses are home to the fewest illegal migrants and could be made to take in more.
In London, two council areas do not have a single migrant HMO.
Kensington and Chelsea commands the highest property wealth and real estate values in the country. It is home to the Prince and Princess of Wales, the Beckhams, and billionaires from around the world - but no migrant HMOs.
The City of London is the other. It is the financial capital of Europe - though it only has around 8,000 permanent residents, mainly in the Barbican estate, as it is mostly office space.
The City's total available and empty office supply sits at approximately 9.8 million square feet - though the national minimum legal size for an HMO bedroom used as sleeping accommodation is 70 square feet.
Around the corner from the Square Mile, leafy north London boroughs Islington and Camden are home to 33 asylum seekers in dispersal accommodation. Camden, which contains well-off areas like Highgate and Primrose Hill, has just seven.
Looking south, some of the nation's most affluent areas have zero migrant HMOs.
Hart District Council in Hampshire has topped national surveys for quality of life. It has none of the controversial HMOs.
There are none in charming Guildford, which sits amid the Surrey Hills, nor in any of the picturesque towns of Tunbridge Wells, Epsom or Sevenoaks.
On the South Coast, which received the infamous mega dinghy on Monday, Arun District Council has no migrant HMOs.
Just one asylum seeker lives in dispersal accommodation in Lewes.
There are just three in dispersal accommodation in Dorset, and none in the entirety of the New Forest and the Isle of Wight.
Cotswold District Council, which oversees the famous rolling hills of the Cotswolds, houses no asylum seekers, but plenty of multi-millionaires, celebrities and aristocrats.
Bath, the historic spa city known for its Unesco World Heritage site city centre, is home to two asylum seekers in dispersal accommodation.
Scenic university cities including Cambridge and York have none. The Isles of Scilly have none. Shakespeare's birthplace of Stratford-upon-Avon have none.
Blackpool, the most deprived local authority in the UK, has 230.
The classic resort town was one of the 13 places to have its asylum hotel shut down last night.
It joined places like Wolverhampton, Loughborough, Nottingham and more to see their hotels made available for guests.
Immigration minister Anna Turley said last night: "For too long, communities have watched hotels at the centre of their towns and cities become symbols of a broken asylum system.
"We are turning that around by ending the use of asylum hotels for good and moving people into larger, basic accommodation like former military sites.
"This Government’s reforms are overhauling the immigration system to restore control at the border, and fairness to our immigration system."
Labour has touted former military barracks as alternatives to the hotels - some of which have already provoked fears among neighbours.
Mr Burnham told GB News he had "begun to become aware" of concerns in Piddington, which sits next to RAF Bicester.
Local children have written letters directly to the Prime Minister, with seven-year-old Rex Perkin explaining he worries he will no longer be able to visit his sister's grave in the village.
"I will listen to what people are saying and respond to the concerns that they are putting forward," he vowed, and said barracks would "create secure space and not have the HMO issues".
His Government plans to expand the capacity at existing and new barracks to house roughly 3,750 people as part of an effort to phase out the use of asylum hotels.
But with tens of thousands of migrants in dispersal accommodation, it remains unclear whether the "HMO issues" will be immediately solved.
