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More on KentOnline
Around 19 young migrants who have recently arrived in Kent will be cared for by councils outside of the county.
The unaccompanied asylum-seeking children have been transferred from Kent County Council (KCC) into the care of other local authorities, including nine in the west Midlands, three in the north west, one in the east and six to neighbouring councils in the south east.
It is the first time that KCC has been able to send young migrants to neighbouring councils for more than two years, since April 2018. The county council is working on another 18 potential placements later this week.
KCC's cabinet member for children's services, Cllr Sue Chandler (Con), described the surge of young migrants entering the county as a "critical situation" for the authority.
Speaking during a virtual KCC cabinet meeting earlier today, she said: "If we see larger unaccompanied asylum-seeking child arrivals in the summer, our capacity will undoubtedly come under pressure again."
Pledges have been made by several local authorities to take on the responsibility of 90 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and provide much-needed aid to KCC in the fast-moving migrant crisis.
But, Cllr Chandler warned: "That is of course only a fraction of those children that have arrived this year, so the work absolutely continues."
A total of 509 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children are under the care of KCC, with nearly 50% of this total arriving on the county's shores over the last six months.
This amounts to more than double the authority's allocation in the voluntary National Transfer Scheme, which is used to fairly distribute children to local authorities nationally, who are then financially compensated.
Just over 250 have arrived since January, with 60 entering the county over the last three weeks, including three this weekend and 65 in May.
Many young migrants travel on boats from France to Kent's shores across the English Channel from France rather than lorries due to the coronavirus lockdown restrictions. Some have arrived from Iraq, Kuwait and Libya.
Around £250,000 of tax payers money is spent each month to provide care for these children while KCC continues to be responsible for 936 care leavers, who are aged between 18 and 25 , county council bosses added.
Once the young migrants arrive they are found suitable accommodation but KCC's capacity to house them has become increasingly difficult in recent weeks and can take up to three months to secure, they add.
Pressure has been put on the Home Office in the last four weeks to provide much-needed relief to the county council. KCC has received a short-term £5million cash boost from Boris Johnson's Government as a result.
Cllr Chandler said: "Although there are several longer term issues that require a resolution, in the short term the additional funding is very good news for Kent taxpayers and will reduce the burden on residents this year.
"But it remains a concern that while the funding increase is welcome, more will need to be done to put the National Transfer Scheme on a sustainable and longer term footing."
On June 9, KCC's leader Cllr Roger Gough (Con) said the county council's position remained "on a knife edge".
