The Home Office has conceded that an asylum camp's conditions could be argued as a human rights breach.

Six people brought the claims against the Home Secretary, after being made to live in Folkestone's Napier Barracks which have been described as "unsafe" and "atrocious".

A Home Affairs Committee heard earlier this month that there was no way for the inhabitants to be kept safe from Covid, with 120 of the 390 residents having tested positive for Covid on January 25 - a figure called "understandably extremely concerning."

Today it was announced the asylum seekers will have a High Court trial, after Home Office lawyers gave the go-ahead for a full trial into conditions in the camp.

It challenged the use of the site on five grounds including that the conditions breach the European Convention on Human Rights, and that it failed to meet essential living needs under the Immigration and Asylum Act.

Furthermore they're arguing it breaches the terms of the contract between the Home Office and its contractor Clearsprings, and that their stay in the camp amounts to unlawful detention.

Minutes before a day-long hearing before Mr Justice Chamberlain was due to start, Home Office lawyers contacted the legal team of four of the complainants - Deighton Pierce Glynn - to say they would concede that all the legal arguments made by DPG were arguable and so permission should be granted.

The Home Office disputed one additional argument made by Mathew Gold & Co Solicitors.

Mr Justice Chamberlain proceeded to grant permission for all five of the grounds put forward by the DPG Claimants and directed that a final hearing will take place in the week commencing April 21.

Sue Willman, solicitor at Deighton Pierce Glynn, the firm representing four of the claimants, said: “The Home Secretary has today conceded that the arguments we made on behalf of asylum seekers held in Napier Barracks were arguable and that the case should go ahead to a full trial.

"This is very welcome news. Our clients were subjected to demeaning conditions in Napier Barracks for over four months before the Home Office was ordered by the Court to move them to alternative adequate accommodation.

"It is due to the determined work of NGOs and campaigners including Care4Calais, Humans For Rights Network, Kent Refugee Action Network, Samphire Project and the Helen Bamber Foundation that this has been brought this to light.

"Refugees arriving in the UK, often after experiencing torture and trafficking, have the right to be provided with basic humane accommodation.

"Disused military barracks at Napier and Penally are far from that and now need to be closed.”

The claimants cannot be identified for legal reasons owing to their asylum status.

This update comes on the same day a letter was distributed to residents local to the Napier Barracks site.

In the letter, Home Secretary Priti Patel stated that the camp "provides safe, suitable and warm accommodation" to the people staying there.

The Home Office has been contacted regarding its lawyers' concession.

Reports suggest there are now around 60 people still at the barracks after hundreds were moved out ahead of an inspection tomorrow.

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