There were around 150 people with police separating the two groups
16:25, 30 Aug 2025Updated 16:29, 30 Aug 2025
Anti-immigration protestors outside a hotel housing asylum seekers in Oldham (Image: Manchester Evening News)
More protests have taken place in Oldham as tensions surrounding the use of hotels to house asylum seekers show no sign of abating.
Around 50 anti-racism protestors gathered outside the Victoria Hotel on Hollinwood Avenue in Chadderton on Saturday (August 30) morning, separated from those protesting against the hotel by a neon-clad line of police.
At first, those from Stand Up To Racism outnumbered the scattered few bearing England flags and Union Jacks some thirty feet away.
The group, a mix of young and old, had a megaphone, loudspeaker and matching placards bearing signs reading ‘refugees welcome’, ‘stop the far right’ and ‘racists, go home’.
They also sang chants such as “Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here,” and “There are many many more of us than you”.
The group from Stand Up to Racism(Image: Manchester Evening News)
By around 1.30pm around 100 anti-immigration protestors had also clustered outside the hotel and lining Hollingwood Way.
That group included families, teenagers, middle-aged couples, children in prams and older people in camping chairs draped in flags.
One woman stood blowing bubbles with a young child in a buggy, next to her daughter who was waving a Union Jack. Other little girls perched on their dad’s shoulders, also draped in flags.
Others still, mostly men aged from their 20s to 40s, were carrying smart-looking Go-Pros and phone-holders, providing commentary and opinion as they recorded and live-streamed.
Many of the anti-immigration group had Go-Pros and other professional recording equipment (Image: Manchester Evening News)
There were Union Jacks everywhere: caps, ties, on bunny ears. One young man filming wore a cap emblazoned with the word TRUMP.
There were shouts of ‘send them back’, ‘you’re not welcome’, ‘keep our streets safe’ and ‘save our children’.
One man directed a megaphone over the hedge towards the curtained windows of the hotel, shouting: “Every single one of yous are going home.”
A man watching from inside the hotel made a hand-heart gesture before shutting his curtains.
An anti-immigration protestor wearing a cap with the legend ‘TRUMP: KEEP AMERICA GREAT'(Image: Manchester Evening News)
The line of police kept the protestors apart, and mostly, it was a peaceful affair. Stand Up to Racism began blasting copyrighted music from a loud-speaker, presumably in hopes of getting the livestreams taken down from Youtube and Facebook for a copyright strike.
“Who made the NHS? Migrants made the NHS,” they chanted. “It was doctors and nurses,” came the counter from the other side.
It was only as the anti-racism group began to wind down their protest that the tensions flared.
Escorted by police, they had to pass by the anti-immigration protestors, who waved sarcastic goodbyes and other obscene gestures at the departing group, shouting ‘go back to where you came from’.
As they left the hotel and made their way up Hollinwood Way towards the tram stop, they were accompanied all the way by the camera-bearing contingent of the anti-immigration protestors.
Still playing copyrighted music to thwart the live-streamers, there was a slightly incongruous scene as men screamed ‘traitors to your country’ and ‘weak, weak lefty scum’ in the group’s faces, in time to the beat of Taylor Swift’s Anti-Hero.
An altercation between a police liason officer and an anti-immigration protestor (Image: Manchester Evening News)
Tensions were high and the anger was palpable, but the only minor scuffle came as a man bearing a Union Jack got in the way of the police, who were trying to keep order while keeping people off the road, a dual carriageway which cars were flying down.
Police formed another barrier, preventing the anti-immigration protesters from following them onto the platform, where anti-racism protesters were singing along to another Taylor Swift song.
From the street below, someone shouted: “Bye, middle-class people. Go back to Didsbury.”
Saturday’s gathering follows a similar protest held outside the hotel last Saturday (August 23). In 2021, it was confirmed the hotel had stopped taking guest bookings and asylum seekers were understood to have been moved in.
At the time, council leader Arooj Shah said: “Oldham has a proud history of welcoming people of all nationalities, and we are ready and willing to play our part in helping these vulnerable people who have been through so much.
Tensions between anti-racism and anti-immigration protestors outside the Victoria Hotel in Oldham(Image: Manchester Evening News)
“While this is a temporary emergency solution, and we do not know exactly when these people will arrive or how long they will be here with us, what I am certain of is that Oldhamers will want to help, and make them as welcome as possible.”
The demonstrations are part of sustained, nationwide protests against such hotels. A number are planned for Saturday across the country, including outside the Bell Hotel in Epping in Essex, where three men have been arrested.
Regular protests had been held outside the Bell after an asylum seeker was charged with trying to kiss a 14-year-old girl, which he denies.
The Government won its appeal on Friday against a High Court ruling temporarily banning asylum seekers from being housed at the hotel, meaning they will still be able to stay there.
In Greater Manchester, there are currently nine hotels being used to house asylum seekers, the Manchester Evening News understands.
Four hotels are still being used to house asylum seekers in Manchester, with one in Oldham; two in Stockport; and two in Trafford.
Protests have taken place in recent weeks outside Cresta Court in Altrincham, where asylum seekers began to move in last year.