Almost 89,000 people sign up to offer homes to Ukrainian refugees

People hold a flag during a demonstration organised by London EuroMaidan and British-Ukrainian volunteers outside Downing Street, London

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said the latest figure was 88,712 on Tuesday morning.

The system for signing up crashed for a period yesterday afternoon shortly after it went live, something a Government Minister has said makes him “actually quite proud”.

James Cleverly told LBC the outage was “a reflection of that generosity of the British people”.

Speaking to LBC this morning, he said: “The irony of this is I’m actually quite proud that the system struggled. We built it quickly. We could have, yes… we could have spent more time stress-testing this website and delayed it a couple of days before launching.

“But, frankly, I’m glad we moved quickly on this and we’re moving quickly to ensure we’re able to help the Ukrainian refugees.”

He added: “I know this is a weird thing to say as a Government minister – I’m glad the website crashed, because it is a reflection of that generosity of the British people.”

Yesterday, Communities Secretary Michael Gove announced the “Homes for Ukraine” scheme as the Government scrambled to make it easier for people to come to the UK following widespread criticism of its response so far.

Almost three million people are now believed to have fled since Putin’s invasion almost three weeks ago.

Previously only Ukrainians with family members already settled in the UK could come.

But under the new scheme, sponsors can provide a route for Ukrainians without family ties to come to the UK.

Mr Gove said “in recognition of their generosity” a tax-free monthly payment of £350 will be provided to people for each family they look after.

Sponsors can be of any nationality as long as they have permission to be in the UK for at least six months.