In an apparent Hail Mary bid to save his sinking premiership, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer rolled out the “racism” accusation on Sunday against one of Nigel Farage’s plans to fix Britain’s immigration system.
To reduce the societal and fiscal impacts of the so-called “Boriswave” of millions of migrants who were allowed into the country after Brexit as a result of Boris Johnson’s immigration liberalisations — which crucially came in contrast to his party’s promises of reducing immigration — Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has proposed scrapping the immigration status of “Indefinite Leave to Remain”, which many of the Boriswave migrants will soon be eligible to apply for.
The status, which approximates permanent residency, allows migrants to live, work, and study in the UK permanently, without any time limit, after they have lived in the country for five years. It also opens up avenues for migrants to bring in family members to the country.
Mr Farage said that his Reform UK party would scrap the status and replace it with a five-year work visa system, similar to that in the United States, and would require migrants to demonstrate English proficiency and sufficient income to remain in the country. Furthermore, the populist party would restrict welfare to British citizens. This, he argued, would result in hundreds of thousands of “burdensome” migrants being removed from the UK.
Indeed, most low-skilled legal migrants represent a net cost to the UK, with the government’s Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) finding last year that on average each low-skilled migrant will cost the country £150,000 by the time they reach 66 years old. This rose to £500,000 by their 80th birthday and over a million should they reach 100 years old. In contrast, the average British-born worker is a net contributor of £280,000 by the time they reach 66.
Despite Farage’s plan being essentially colourblind in nature, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer struck out at Mr Farage on Sunday on the sidelines of his contentious Labour Party conference in Liverpool.
Speaking with the BBC, Starmer said: “I do think it’s a racist policy, I do think it’s immoral – it needs to be called out for what it is… It’s one thing to say we’re going to remove illegal migrants, people who have no right to be here, I’m up for that.
“It’s completely different thing to say we’re going to reach in to people who are lawfully here and start removing them… They are our neighbours, they’re people who work in our economy, they’re part of who we are. It will rip this country apart.”
When pressed on whether this meant that those who support the Reform party are also racist, Starmer prevaricated, saying that there are “plenty of people who either vote Reform or are thinking of voting Reform who are frustrated”. However, the PM did not specifically rule out that there are racists amongst Reform voters.
Reform’s Zia Yusuf responded: “Labour’s message to the country is clear: pay hundreds of billions for foreign nationals to live off the state forever, or Labour will call you racist.”
For his part, Mr Farage said, “Keir Starmer has spent his entire weekend attacking Reform. This is the reason why,” while sharing an image of a poll predicting Reform to win a strong majority at the next election.
A YouGov poll published over the weekend found that although most people do not want to see people stripped of ILR if they have already achieved the status, a plurality of Britons, 44 per cent, would support scrapping Indefinite Leave to Remain as a policy.
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