Nigel Farage is using parliament’s summer break to garner more headlines and public support for Reform UK’s hardline approach to immigration and asylum. Tomorrow, he will unveil a “detain and deport” strategy to remove all migrants who arrive in Britain illegally. Those crossing the Channel in small boats would be barred from claiming asylum.
The Farage pitch will doubtless appeal to voters who are increasingly anxious about the highly visible problems of the crossings and asylum hotels – both symbols of a government not in control. The irony is that some of the right-wing politicians now exploiting these issues by irresponsibly stirring up community tensions, including Farage, are the same crew who, at the 2016 EU referendum, told us that Brexit would enable the government to “take back control” of immigration.
Farage rarely mentions Brexit today – I wonder why? – but his latest pitch is working. Reform enjoys a 10-point lead over Labour in the opinion polls, and according to YouGov, almost one in three voters think Reform would handle immigration best, while nine per cent say Labour and six per cent the Conservatives.
Although many voters have lost confidence in the mainstream parties and feel they have nothing to lose by opting for Reform, closer inspection of Farage’s immigration prospectus reveals a collection of the Tories’ greatest hits – or perhaps I should say, misses. The Reform UK leader is open to reviving the flawed scheme to deport migrants to Rwanda. He would also try to have asylum claims processed in countries such as Albania, which has rejected the idea. As a “fallback,” he would use British overseas territories such as Ascension Island in the South Atlantic, despite the huge cost and logistical difficulties. More worryingly, a Reform government (yes, it could happen) would seek to send asylum seekers from Afghanistan and Eritrea back to these countries, even though they might be tortured or killed.
Of course, Farage is skilful enough to make these solutions sound easy. Right-wing newspapers will probably welcome them, without subjecting them to the scrutiny they give any of Labour’s proposals. Back in the real world, if there were a simple answer to the small boats crisis, it would have been implemented by the previous and current governments.
Some of Farage’s measures would fall foul of international agreements such as the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, so Reform would withdraw from both. A British Bill of Rights – another old Tory chestnut – would be introduced. Mr Farage’s move is deliberately timed to get ahead of Kemi Badenoch’s decision on whether the Tories would leave the ECHR, expected next month. They will almost certainly pledge to do so, but will now be left trailing in Reform’s wake.
Some Labour figures, increasingly worried that the government is losing the argument on immigration, want to act on the ECHR. David Blunkett, the peer and former home secretary, is calling for the government to temporarily suspend its ECHR and Refugee Council membership.
I don’t think Starmer should go that far. However, his long-held commitment to international law should not preclude his government from reforming such agreements. The UK should collaborate with other countries to rewrite the conventions for today’s world and prevent British courts from overinterpreting clauses such as the ECHR’s Article 8 commitment to family life, the government’s review of which should be concluded swiftly.
Starmer’s incremental approach will not win as many headlines as Farage’s, but it is essentially the right one. The latest idea from Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, is to speed up the handling of the 51,000 appeals against asylum decisions (which on average take more than a year) by transferring decisions from judges to trained adjudicators. This is a sensible course, but the legislation itself should also be fast-tracked so it takes effect in months rather than years. The Home Office should invest in getting asylum decisions right the first time, since almost half are currently overturned on appeal.
Starmer’s “one in, one out” returns deal with France has potential, but to become a deterrent, it will have to be scaled up beyond the estimated 50 asylum seekers going each way each week. The prime minister should stick to it even if it does not bear immediate fruit or, as ministers privately fear, it becomes gummed up by legal challenges.
During what will be a challenging autumn for his government, Starmer needs to better explain the action he is taking on immigration on several fronts. Selling his painstaking, patient approach will not be easy, as he competes with the snake oil offered by Farage. Starmer will need to expose Reform’s medicine for what it is, while explaining that there is no elixir.
