asylumstatsFollow the money
Northern Ireland

Belfast

Updated 30 Jun 2026 · Home Office · Corrections log
Gavin Robinson
Gavin RobinsonDUP · Belfast East

4 MPs cover constituencies in or overlapping Belfast.

1,540 people on asylum support in Belfast

Rank 5 of 361 councils nationally. The rate of 43.7 per 10,000 puts Belfast in the 97th percentile. That means this area carries more asylum seekers per head than 97% of the country. 13 of them receive subsistence only and are not in Home Office accommodation. Accommodation and support for 1,540 people at £107 per person per day is about £60.1M a year.

What asylum costs Belfast

£34.8Mestimated hotel costs/year
£3.9Msubsistence payments/year
£1.8MLA dispersal grant/year

Estimates based on 1,540 people on asylum support in Belfast(1.65% of 93,293 nationally at 30 Jun 2026). Hotel costs pro-rated from £5.77M/day national spend in 2024/25 (House of Commons Library, CDP-2025-0184). Subsistence: £49.18/week per person.

How many asylum seekers are in Belfast?

1,540 people were receiving Home Office asylum support in Belfast at 30 June 2026, the most recent quarter published. That ranks 5th of 361 UK local authorities. It counts people on support at that date, which is not the number who claimed asylum there and not the number waiting for a decision.

How many asylum seekers per 10,000 people are in Belfast?

43.7 per 10,000 residents, which places Belfast in the 97th percentile of UK local authorities. It carries more people on asylum support per head than 97% of the country. Rate is the fair comparison between areas, because a large city carries more people than a small district at the same pressure per head.

Are there asylum hotels in Belfast?

Not on the published figures. Belfast recorded nobody in contingency accommodation at 30 June 2026, which is the category that includes hotels. The 1,540 people on asylum support there are recorded in dispersal housing or on subsistence-only support.

Who houses asylum seekers in Belfast?

Mears holds the Home Office asylum accommodation contract for the region Belfast sits in, under the Asylum Accommodation and Support Contracts. The contract covers a whole region rather than a single council, and the Home Office does not publish a council-by-council split of which properties sit under it.

Are all of them in Home Office accommodation in Belfast?

No. 13 of the 1,540 on support in Belfast, about 1%, receive subsistence only: a cash payment with no accommodation, usually because they are living with friends or family. The rest are in Home Office accommodation, which covers dispersal housing and hotels.

Belfast: asylum numbers falling

Quarter-end stock series to Jun 2026. A rise or fall is a net change in the number of people on support at period end, not the number of new claims or distinct people moving through the caseload. Support stock also overlaps with, but is not identical to, the awaiting-decision backlog.

1,540
2,6811,7878940Mar 2014Jun 2026Peak Jun 2023Rwanda schemeAlbania dealBibby StockholmRwanda scrapped
Exact values
PeriodValue
Mar 2014479
Jun 2014465
Sept 2014453
Dec 2014472
Mar 2015491
Jun 2015496
Sept 2015501
Dec 2015544
Mar 2016549
Jun 2016573
Sept 2016570
Dec 2016636
Mar 2017681
Jun 2017683
Sept 2017716
Dec 2017715
Mar 2018814
Jun 2018867
Sept 2018912
Dec 2018976
Mar 2019940
Jun 2019915
Sept 2019827
Dec 2019960
Mar 2020923
Jun 2020930
Sept 2020951
Dec 2020931
Mar 2021903
Jun 2021873
Sept 2021960
Dec 20211,044
Mar 20221,215
Jun 20221,368
Sept 20221,491
Dec 20222,550
Mar 20232,378
Jun 20232,681
Sept 20232,498
Dec 20232,043
Mar 20242,062
Jun 20241,863
Sept 20241,888
Dec 20241,940
Mar 20251,841
Jun 20251,760
Sept 20251,779
Dec 20251,749
Mar 20261,607
Jun 20261,540

Trend

-67Latest quarter change
+1,061Change across series
50Official data points

Local numbers

Accommodation split

Dispersal accommodation1,484
Initial accommodation43
Subsistence only13
Contingency accommodation0

Pathway breakdown

Supported asylum
1,540
Homes for Ukraine
310
Afghan programme
62
Resettlement cumulative
419

Other routes

Homes for Ukraine310
Afghan programme62
Resettlement cumulative419

Population context

All pathways total1,912
Share of local population0.54%
Local geographyThe shared local-authority geography record and its source coverage.Place record on UK Places