The normally sleepy, suburban town of Epping is an unlikely place to find itself at the frontline of Britain’s migration battle. Yet the small market town, located in Essex on the outskirts of London, has recently been host to uncharacteristic unrest.
The focus of locals’ ire is, as in so many other towns and villages all over Europe, the local refugee centre. In Epping, this is The Bell Hotel, where an unknown number of male asylum seekers are currently being housed. There have long been grumblings among residents about the centre, going back as far as the COVID-19 pandemic. For a short while, it accommodated migrant families during lockdown, but the site was later abandoned. The government then began placing single males there recently, without consulting the people already living in Epping.
Things came to a head earlier this month, when it emerged that one of the asylum seekers living in the hotel had been accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl. The Ethiopian man, named Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, denied the charges in court last Thursday. To rub salt into the wound, Kebatu reportedly only arrived in the UK (illegally, of course) a mere eight days before.
This naturally sparked concern and outrage throughout the town. To make matters worse, the Bell Hotel was located just a 10-minute walk away from a secondary school, leading some to fear that more crimes would follow. On Sunday, July 13th, around 300 residents gathered outside the hotel to protest, in what was initially a very peaceful demonstration, even attended by children and older members of the community. People held homemade banners with slogans such as “Protect our kids” and “Send them home.” No arrests were made.
Last Thursday, though, tensions ramped up again following Kebatu’s appearance in court. During this, we learnt that he had allegedly approached his teenage victim “on a busy high street”, trying to kiss her. It was also confirmed that Kebatu had entered the UK “informally on a boat” and that he had only been in the country since June 29th. Apparently, immigration authorities also admitted that he has “no ties to anyone or any place in the UK.”
On Thursday evening, more protests broke out near the Bell Hotel. Again, they started peacefully. But as the night went on, interactions between furious protestors and police officers became increasingly hostile. In one video posted to social media, a man can be seen squaring up to police, before an officer slams his riot shield into his face, smashing the man’s teeth out of his head. In another shocking video, a police van appears to drive straight through another protestor, knocking him down (something that would obviously never have happened if these were Just Stop Oil or pro-Palestine activists). The presence of left-wing counter-demonstrators, some of which appear to have come from outside Epping, only inflamed tensions further and several scuffles ensued. Six arrests have been made so far relating to the disturbance last Thursday.
Then, last Sunday, the protestors returned. This time, things managed to stay largely peaceful. Once again, the message was clear, with locals chanting “send them home” and “save our kids.” For the most part, these were not opportunistic thugs looking for trouble, but tired and disgruntled people looking for change. As one mother-of-three put it in an impromptu speech to the crowd, “We are all good, local, taxpaying people.” Posing the question to UK prime minister Keir Starmer, she asked: “Why are you letting 500, 600 undocumented men come across the Channel every day? … We don’t know who they are, we don’t know what their background is. They don’t share our values. They don’t respect women, and they do not respect children.”
Perhaps one of the most frustrating aspects about this whole ordeal is that many of Epping’s local politicians seem to agree with this sentiment. Both the leader of Epping Forest District Council and local MP Neil Hudson have called for the Home Office to shut down the asylum centre. This view was echoed by nearby MP for Brentwood and Ongar, Alex Burghart. And yet everyone in this situation remains apparently powerless to do anything about it.
If this story sounds familiar, that’s because the situation in Epping is virtually identical to everywhere else that anti-migrant protests erupt. Just last month in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, riots broke out when two teenagers with a migrant background allegedly assaulted a young girl. And across the border in Ireland last year, a series of protests were staged over asylum seekers being forced on small rural towns. Residents tried their best to block the arrival of newcomers, even going so far as to blockade roads and bring buses to a halt, but ultimately the Irish government refused to listen to its people.
The stark consequences of ignoring citizens’ concerns can be clearly seen in Spain. In Torre Pacheco in the south-east of the country, the unprovoked attack on a 68-year-old man by a group of North African migrants led to almost a week of rioting recently. The incident was just a flashpoint in building tensions between residents and new arrivals, which has seen the streets overrun with violence. Migrants, locals, and riot police clashed, with fireworks, flares, and bottles being used as makeshift weapons.
If the likes of Torre Pacheco and Epping show how fast a town can ignite, Poland shows how such a movement can scale. Last Saturday, anti-immigration protests cropped up in more than 80 cities across the country. They made the same demands as their Spanish, Irish, and British counterparts: tighter border controls and for the government to put its own people first. The Polish protests also come after some particularly fed-up citizens started to take matters into their own hands, patrolling the border with Germany to ensure no illegal migrants entered.
As the vast majority of these protestors will point out, they are not racist or ‘far right.’ They are simply tired of being ignored by the politicians who are supposed to represent them. As one of the homemade banners in Epping read: “I’m not far right, I’m worried about my kids.” Wherever violence and lawlessness occurs at these protests, it is despicable. But at the same time, it should not be considered extreme or beyond the pale to ask governments to protect their people from foreign criminals. Or to demand that local communities do not have asylum seekers forced upon them, without being asked or even informed beforehand.
UK culture secretary Lisa Nandy recently claimed that the North of England was so tense and fractured, that it could “go up in flames” at any moment. Evidently, it’s not just here where people are feeling frustrated. The uncomfortable truth that our elites would rather ignore is that these tensions did not spring up overnight. Rather, this is the result of years of deliberate political choices to open borders and welcome the world, regardless of who was being ushered in.
The solution is unbelievably simple. Start seriously listening to Essex mums, Irish farmers, and Spanish workers. Or else there will be a lot more fires that need putting out.
The Epping Protests: When Frustration Turns into Anger
A protester poses with a handmade placard outside The Bell Hotel that houses asylum seekers in Epping, England on July 20, 2025.
Justin Tallis / AFP
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The normally sleepy, suburban town of Epping is an unlikely place to find itself at the frontline of Britain’s migration battle. Yet the small market town, located in Essex on the outskirts of London, has recently been host to uncharacteristic unrest.
The focus of locals’ ire is, as in so many other towns and villages all over Europe, the local refugee centre. In Epping, this is The Bell Hotel, where an unknown number of male asylum seekers are currently being housed. There have long been grumblings among residents about the centre, going back as far as the COVID-19 pandemic. For a short while, it accommodated migrant families during lockdown, but the site was later abandoned. The government then began placing single males there recently, without consulting the people already living in Epping.
Things came to a head earlier this month, when it emerged that one of the asylum seekers living in the hotel had been accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl. The Ethiopian man, named Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, denied the charges in court last Thursday. To rub salt into the wound, Kebatu reportedly only arrived in the UK (illegally, of course) a mere eight days before.
This naturally sparked concern and outrage throughout the town. To make matters worse, the Bell Hotel was located just a 10-minute walk away from a secondary school, leading some to fear that more crimes would follow. On Sunday, July 13th, around 300 residents gathered outside the hotel to protest, in what was initially a very peaceful demonstration, even attended by children and older members of the community. People held homemade banners with slogans such as “Protect our kids” and “Send them home.” No arrests were made.
Last Thursday, though, tensions ramped up again following Kebatu’s appearance in court. During this, we learnt that he had allegedly approached his teenage victim “on a busy high street”, trying to kiss her. It was also confirmed that Kebatu had entered the UK “informally on a boat” and that he had only been in the country since June 29th. Apparently, immigration authorities also admitted that he has “no ties to anyone or any place in the UK.”
On Thursday evening, more protests broke out near the Bell Hotel. Again, they started peacefully. But as the night went on, interactions between furious protestors and police officers became increasingly hostile. In one video posted to social media, a man can be seen squaring up to police, before an officer slams his riot shield into his face, smashing the man’s teeth out of his head. In another shocking video, a police van appears to drive straight through another protestor, knocking him down (something that would obviously never have happened if these were Just Stop Oil or pro-Palestine activists). The presence of left-wing counter-demonstrators, some of which appear to have come from outside Epping, only inflamed tensions further and several scuffles ensued. Six arrests have been made so far relating to the disturbance last Thursday.
Then, last Sunday, the protestors returned. This time, things managed to stay largely peaceful. Once again, the message was clear, with locals chanting “send them home” and “save our kids.” For the most part, these were not opportunistic thugs looking for trouble, but tired and disgruntled people looking for change. As one mother-of-three put it in an impromptu speech to the crowd, “We are all good, local, taxpaying people.” Posing the question to UK prime minister Keir Starmer, she asked: “Why are you letting 500, 600 undocumented men come across the Channel every day? … We don’t know who they are, we don’t know what their background is. They don’t share our values. They don’t respect women, and they do not respect children.”
Perhaps one of the most frustrating aspects about this whole ordeal is that many of Epping’s local politicians seem to agree with this sentiment. Both the leader of Epping Forest District Council and local MP Neil Hudson have called for the Home Office to shut down the asylum centre. This view was echoed by nearby MP for Brentwood and Ongar, Alex Burghart. And yet everyone in this situation remains apparently powerless to do anything about it.
If this story sounds familiar, that’s because the situation in Epping is virtually identical to everywhere else that anti-migrant protests erupt. Just last month in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, riots broke out when two teenagers with a migrant background allegedly assaulted a young girl. And across the border in Ireland last year, a series of protests were staged over asylum seekers being forced on small rural towns. Residents tried their best to block the arrival of newcomers, even going so far as to blockade roads and bring buses to a halt, but ultimately the Irish government refused to listen to its people.
The stark consequences of ignoring citizens’ concerns can be clearly seen in Spain. In Torre Pacheco in the south-east of the country, the unprovoked attack on a 68-year-old man by a group of North African migrants led to almost a week of rioting recently. The incident was just a flashpoint in building tensions between residents and new arrivals, which has seen the streets overrun with violence. Migrants, locals, and riot police clashed, with fireworks, flares, and bottles being used as makeshift weapons.
If the likes of Torre Pacheco and Epping show how fast a town can ignite, Poland shows how such a movement can scale. Last Saturday, anti-immigration protests cropped up in more than 80 cities across the country. They made the same demands as their Spanish, Irish, and British counterparts: tighter border controls and for the government to put its own people first. The Polish protests also come after some particularly fed-up citizens started to take matters into their own hands, patrolling the border with Germany to ensure no illegal migrants entered.
As the vast majority of these protestors will point out, they are not racist or ‘far right.’ They are simply tired of being ignored by the politicians who are supposed to represent them. As one of the homemade banners in Epping read: “I’m not far right, I’m worried about my kids.” Wherever violence and lawlessness occurs at these protests, it is despicable. But at the same time, it should not be considered extreme or beyond the pale to ask governments to protect their people from foreign criminals. Or to demand that local communities do not have asylum seekers forced upon them, without being asked or even informed beforehand.
UK culture secretary Lisa Nandy recently claimed that the North of England was so tense and fractured, that it could “go up in flames” at any moment. Evidently, it’s not just here where people are feeling frustrated. The uncomfortable truth that our elites would rather ignore is that these tensions did not spring up overnight. Rather, this is the result of years of deliberate political choices to open borders and welcome the world, regardless of who was being ushered in.
The solution is unbelievably simple. Start seriously listening to Essex mums, Irish farmers, and Spanish workers. Or else there will be a lot more fires that need putting out.
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