UK Construction and Law
Ten days to object: representations open today on 1,256 modular asylum beds at MOD Bicester
By Staff Writer | 7 September 2026
The Home Office wants a former defence depot east of Bicester turned into non-detained asylum accommodation for ten years, built in three phases of stacked modular units. The urgent Crown development route gives the public until 17 September to write in, and the Prime Minister has promised the local MP a personal look at the file.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government accepted the application on 2 September 2026 under reference PCU/RARE/C3105/3378843 and published it the same day. Its status line was updated on Friday: the representation period begins today, 7 September, and closes on 17 September. Representations go by email to Crowncasework@communities.gov.uk and will not be acknowledged individually. Only material planning considerations will count.
What is being applied for
The application is for full planning permission for the temporary change of use of the former defence storage and distribution centre at MOD Bicester (A-site), Bicester Garrison, Launton Road, OX25 1AE. Building A6 is retained and converted; other buildings and structures are demolished; new modular accommodation is erected with space for health and welfare facilities, a wastewater treatment plant, roads, security infrastructure, parking, staff accommodation and open space. The stated capacity is up to 1,256 service users, and the application documents describe a temporary use for ten years.
The Home Office's covering letter of 6 July 2026 puts the application under sections 293B to 293E of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 and the Town and Country Planning (Crown Development) (Urgent Applications) (Procedure) (England) Order 2025. The agreed application fee was 76,482 pounds.
I have been asked to notify you, on behalf of the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities & Local Government, that the above planning proposal has been deemed Nationally Important and Urgent.
Matthew Pennycook, Minister of State for Housing and Planning, letter of 13 July 2026
Three phases on existing hardstanding
The Secretary of State's screening direction of 26 August 2026 sets out the build. The site is about 10.1 hectares in the northern part of a 50.5 hectare depot constructed between 1941 and 1943, roughly 6 km south east of central Bicester, with HM Prison Bullingdon about 307 metres to the south west across the B4011 and the village of Piddington about 250 metres to the south east. Phase 1 places double-stacked accommodation for 408 people, 384 standard and 24 medical isolation, on hardstanding now used as a storage yard, with a kitchen and dining facility, an eight-room medical centre, a reception building, laundry, offices and 90 parking spaces, and involves no demolition. Phase 2 adds 216 in the central zone with 57 more spaces and a gym in an existing building. Phase 3 adds 632, with outdoor recreation, below-ground attenuation tanks and a surface water pumping station.
Across the three phases the written statement lists 600 accommodation units, 92 WC units, 64 shower units, 192 ancillary units, 24 staff facility units and 12 site function units, each 2.4 by 6 metres, no more than two storeys and 6 metres high, plus four electrical substations and a water tank and pump house. Five Nissen huts are to be demolished with their concrete slabs kept for reuse. The applicant intends bedspaces to be available during 2026.
The direction treats the scheme as Schedule 2 development under paragraph 10(b) of the 2017 EIA Regulations and directs that it is not EIA development, so no environmental statement is required. It records that most of the site is in Flood Zone 1, with a small north eastern corner in Zones 2 and 3, and estimates staff commuting at 260 vehicle movements in 24 hours with 192 service vehicle movements a day.
The politics arrived first
On 1 September, before the application was published, Calum Miller told the Commons that residents of Bicester, Piddington, Blackthorn, Ambrosden and Arncott faced a proposal the Government had called urgent 55 days earlier yet had not published, and asked the Prime Minister to withdraw it.
I give the hon. Member for Bicester and Woodstock (Calum Miller) a commitment that I will familiarise myself with all the details of the planning application. I will happily report back from this Dispatch Box when I have done that.
Andy Burnham, Prime Minister, House of Commons, 1 September 2026
The Home Office's statement of national importance says that as at 31 December 2025 some 107,000 people were in receipt of asylum support, 31,000 of them, or 29 per cent, in hotels. Some application documents are withheld as sensitive under section 293B(11) of the 1990 Act.
For consultants and contractors, the point to note is the route. An urgent Crown application is decided by the Secretary of State, not Cherwell District Council, whose own comments are invited separately under article 15 of the 2025 Order. Anyone with a planning objection has ten days from today.