Homeless people are being charged to stay at hotels during the pandemic.

Under the Emergency Powers Act, people without a permanent residence are living at the Sefton Express, near the airport, and Athol House, Douglas.

Residents who stay at the hotels are being charged £192.25 a week, either from their own money or deducted from benefits.

Concerns have now been raised about how those relying on benefits were affording the costs and if it was placing them into debt or leaving them with no money.

Health and Social Care Minister David Ashford insisted this won’t be the case.

’It’s ensuring that people who haven’t anywhere else to go, who have been couch surfing in some cases for a very, very long time, actually have a roof over their head,’ he told a press briefing.

’So the benefits system has allowed them to get accommodation. To be able to provide that for them is something I think we need to look at long term.’

He added that rather than thinking of homeless people as just those on the street, it was important to think of couch surfers and their lack of a permanent residence.

Those staying at the hotels are provided three meals a day. When the issue was discussed in Tynwald last week, Chief Minister Howard Quayle said that 21 people had been identified as having no fixed abode, including people ’sleeping rough and in cars’.

Ramsey MHK Lawrie Hooper (Lib Vannin) said the need for the scheme showed ’our current approach to housing on the Isle of Man is not fit for purpose’. He added: ’It is somewhat appalling that we have to rely on making emergency powers to make sure people can have a roof over their heads.’

Homelessness charity Graih announced on March 21 that it was having to close its daytime drop-in centre, in line with government advice on social distancing. Instead it said it would be putting all its efforts into keeping the night shelter open and to visiting the most vulnerable in the community.