Hampshire’s councils spent more than £31 million on social care for asylum seekers last year, new figures reveal, with unaccompanied children driving most of the cost.

Data published by TaxPayers’ Alliance from local authority spending shows that Hampshire County Council, Southampton City Council, Portsmouth City Council and the Isle of Wight together spent approximately £31.7 million supporting asylum seekers during the most recent financial year.

The vast majority of the cost fell on Hampshire County Council, which spent £23.935 million on asylum seeker social care in 2024, making it the second-highest spending council in the country on asylum seeker social care, after Kent County Council, which spent £41.5 million.

This marked a dramatic rise compared with previous years, when the council went from zero expenditure in 2019 to nearly £24 million within five years.

Of the county’s total, £20.1 million went to support looked-after asylum-seeking children, while £1.92 million went to adult asylum seekers.

Government figures show Hampshire was responsible for 305 unaccompanied children as of March 31, 2024, falling to 181 by March 2025.

According to the TaxPayers’ Alliance, the increase has been driven by a combination of rising adult social care pressures and a growth in the number of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) entering local authority care.

Under national arrangements, adults and families may be placed in local authority areas through the Home Office’s dispersal system. However, unaccompanied children become the statutory responsibility of the local authority as soon as they present at a port, airport, coastline or immigration processing site.

In the wider region, Southampton City Council recorded the second-highest expenditure, spending £3.32 million on asylum seeker support in 2024. About £1.6 million of this supported looked-after children.

This represented a small decrease of around 0.8 per cent compared with the previous year, when spending totalled £3.35 million.

Portsmouth City Council spent £2.416 million, up 14% year on year, with £2.4 million going to looked-after children.

The Isle of Wight Council spent £2.096 million, down from £2.458 million in 2023, including £1.26 million on looked-after children.

Home Office data shows that, as of March 2025, more than 1,300 asylum seekers were receiving support from local authorities across Hampshire.

Of these, Portsmouth was supporting 749 people, while Southampton supported 286.

A Hampshire County Council spokesperson said: “The county council has a legal duty to safeguard and support any vulnerable child or adult, regardless of their immigration status.

“The majority of the funding referenced in the report is spent on children, both those living with their families, as well as unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC), and comes to the local authority, by way of a grant, from central government.”