Inside the floating barge that’s set to hold 500 asylum seekers

The Metro says A three-storey barracks barge will now be the temporary home for asylum seekers arriving on British shores, the Government has confirmed.

The Home Office said today that the Bibby Stockholm, a large block of flats stacked atop a floating platform, has been leased for 18 months.

The ‘basic and functional accommodation’ will have around-the-clock security on-board to ‘minimise the disruption to local communities’, the Home Office said.

Bibby Stockholm contains a basic gym, bar, games room and more than 220 en-suite bedrooms, according to a fact sheet from owners Bibby Maritime.

New arrivals will start to be housed on the ship ‘in the coming months’, the Home Office added.

The deal was signed earlier today by the Home Office to charter the 91-metre ship docked in Portland Port, Dorset. The department has not yet set out of the cost of the agreement.